Day 43: Swan vs. Swan

Brown Feather would not
sound as appetizing

Last night I had to make a rare trip away from the Bottle Wonderland Estate.  When I returned Mrs. Bottle was waiting to make our next drink.  I had already looked at the ingredients and wasn’t hopeful about how it would taste.  “Tonight’s drink is going to be bad” I speculated.  “I don’t care” replied Mrs. Bottle, “I’m going to drink it all anyway.”   I guess she had a bad day.  If we ever talked I would probably have more details to share.

The aforementioned drink is the Black Feather, a mix of brandy, dry vermouth, triple sec, and angostura bitters.  I wouldn’t call this drink my favorite, but it wasn’t altogether unpleasant. The brandy flavor shines through with just a hint of sweetness thanks to the triple sec.  It is the type of drink where if I had it on a regular basis I would probably start to really enjoy it.  We only have  about 1,460 more drinks to try before we can start thinking about adding a new drink to the standard rotation, so I will be sure to stock up on brandy and vermouth in early 2015.  Based on history, we will probably have some of our current supply left so that won't be necessary.

The name Black Feather reminds me of the scene in Black Swan where Nina (Natalie Portman), who is embracing her role as the sensual Black Swan, begins to sprout black feathers from her back.  In a panic, she goes to see her understudy Lily (Mila Kunis).  Nina and Lily have a complex relationship since they are bitter rivals yet find themselves strangely attracted to one another.  When Lily unlocks herself from Nina's sultry gaze, she plucks a feather from Nina's back.  Much to Lily's surprise, the feather is actually a bomb that explodes and instantly kills her.  Needless to say, this was shocking to see.

My memory isn't what is used to be, so I may have some of that last bit conflated with a Spy vs. Spy episode. 

Black Swan Poster

Overall Rating for the Black Feather

Taste: 3

Presentation: 4 – Classy with a lemon twist

Ease of Preparation: 3 – Making a lemon twist is tricky

Drinks Until Blackout: 4 –25% alcohol

Ingredients

1 oz Brandy

1 oz Dry Vermouth

.5 oz Triple Sec

1 dash Angostura Bitters

Day 42: Watson, Come Here - We Need Booze

As I write this I just finished watching Watson completely destroy Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter on Jeopardy.  Watson finished with a higher score than the combined totals of the humans and it rarely made a mistake. I’m sure there will be dozens of articles that compare this moment to when HAL takes over during 2001: A Space Odyssey or when Skynet becomes self-aware and eventually unleashes Terminators to destroy mankind and Christian Bale.  Those comparisons are easy and obvious, otherwise I wouldn’t have thought of them.  For me, a more personal moment comes to mind.

Even this guy can't beat Watson

It reminds me of January 17, 1996.  That is the day when I realized that I could not beat game number 11,982 of Freecell no matter how much I tried.  I already knew I could not beat a computer at chess, Reversi, Connect Four, or checkers, but once I couldn't even win Solitaire I knew it had a larger meaning.  I accepted on that day that machines are pretty much better at everything than I am.  As the years passed it became ever more apparent.  Mathematics, translation, lovemaking, navigation, and composing music are just some of the arenas where I have been bested by machines.  I’m sure the list is much longer, but computers are also better at making lists than I am. 

Red sky at morning,
drinker take warning

Watson might be smarter than me, but he derives no pleasure from adult beverages, which is the whole reason we are here. Suck it, Watson. Today we have tequila, vodka, triple sec, orange juice, and grenadine, also known as a Hairy Sunrise.  It is basically a Tequila Sunrise with the addition of vodka and triple sec.  I like a good Tequila Sunrise and I like vodka and triple sec, but I do not like them all mixed together.  This drink really had an “off” flavor.  Neither Mrs. Bottle nor I could figure out exactly what caused it.  Each ingredient tasted fine individually, but just didn’t go together.  It also didn’t come close to filling the glass.  We followed the instructions explicitly and you can see the results.   It looks ridiculous.  Not only that, but it is the second time a drink with tequila and orange juice came up short, both literally and figuratively. Did anyone even test these recipes?

I bet those instructions were written by a computer trying to keep us down.  Or maybe it knew the drink was bad and it was trying to save us?  We'll never know.

Overall Rating for the Hairy Sunrise

Taste: 2

Presentation: 4 – Would be a 5 if it filled the glass

Ease of Preparation: 4

Drinks Until Blackout: 7 – 14% alcohol

Ingredients

.75 oz Tequila

.75 oz Vodka

.5 oz Triple Sec

3 oz Orange Juice

2 dashes Grenadine

Day 41: Short Squirt and a Long Jacket

Two Pineapples and a
Microphone

For today’s drink we have the Gin Squirt, a mixture of gin, simple syrup, grenadine, and club soda. The drink wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t anything that we would try again.  It had a strong gin flavor which I enjoyed quite a bit more than Mrs. Bottle did.  The next most prevalent flavor was club soda.  Even though my love of carbonation has been well documented, I don’t really care for club soda (more on this in a minute).  There was also a hint of sweetness thanks to the simple syrup.  All the grenadine added was a light pink hue.  The fruit garnish was a nice touch, but it couldn’t elevate the drink past mediocrity.

I thought the Gin Squirt would have been greatly improved by omitting the simple syrup and grenadine and substituting tonic water for club soda.   I would then have a Gin and Tonic, which is delicious, instead of a Gin Squirt, which is not.  The tonic water makes all the difference.  There are plenty of detailed explanations of the differences between club soda and tonic water available with a little searching, but I can boil it down here: Club soda is just carbonated water. Tonic water is club soda with quinine. The quinine not only makes the tonic water taste better than club soda, it also prevents malaria.  You might read things that claim otherwise, but I have been drinking Gin and Tonics for years and I have never contracted malaria. Quod erat demonstrandum.

More fun to say than to drink

This is our first squirt, but it will not be our last.  We will be having a Whiskey Squirt at some point down the road.  The only difference between the two is that the Whiskey Squirt has ginger ale instead of club soda.  Just kidding, it has whiskey instead of gin. I’m looking forward to it because you can’t have too many squirts. It is also fun to say squirt. Squirt squirt squirt.

Overall Rating for the Gin Squirt

Taste: 3

Presentation: 4

Ease of Preparation: 3 – Tricky Garnish

Drinks Until Blackout: 9 – 11% alcohol

Ingredients

1.5 oz Gin

1 tbsp Simple Syrup

1 tsp Grenadine

Club Soda (fill)

Day 40: A Citronella Story

Will not repel mosquitos

G’day!  Bienvenue! Goedendag! Konnichiwa!  Welcome!  We are at day 40 of our journey.  The astute reader may notice that there are more than forty posts, but we are only counting the official Mr. Boston drink days as days. Since 40 is a nice round number we thought we would reflect a little on our journey. I took a look at our blog statistics to see the global impact of TBIAW. It turns out that so far we have had visitors from 10 different countries.  We only have relatives in 3 of them, so at least 7 people have visited by mistake.

We’ll have more time for reflection later, so let’s talk about today’s drink, the Citronella Cooler.  It is made from citrus-flavored vodka, lemonade, cranberry juice, and lime juice.  As you might guess, it had a strong lemon flavor, although Mrs. Bottle thought the cranberry was also quite distinct.  I thought it mostly tasted like lemonade with a bit of zing.  This would make an excellent drink on a warm summer’s day.  It certainly kicks the crap out of a glass of plain lemonade. It probably isn’t too manly, but I can live with that.

The Citronella Cooler rated a perfect score of 5.  This is our fifth drink to make our top drinks list. In the same time we have only added three drinks to the bottom drinks list. In the last 40 days we have learned that we have a way to go before we can fully appreciate whiskey, but we are making progress.  We have also had stunning investigations that exposed both Galliano (twice) and My Cousin Vinnie.  In the same time period, the government of Egypt has been peacefully toppled.  We could debate for hours which thing is more important, but I think there is no debate on who had more fun.

Otherwise they can't get to TBIAW

Overall Rating for Citronella Cooler

Taste: 5
Presentation: 4 – A garnish other than a watermelon slice would have pushed it to a 5
Ease of Preparation: 5
Drinks Until Blackout: 10 – 10% alcohol

Ingredients

1 oz Citrus-Flavored Vodka
2 oz Lemonade
1 oz Cranberry Juice
1 dash Lime Juice

Day 39: A Delicacy of Jimmies Robed in Frothy Cream



This looks a lot like yesterday's but
this one isn't terrible

It is Valentine’s Day and it is also the seventh and final day of Romance Week.  Today’s drink is the Lover’s Kiss, a cordial made with amaretto, cherry brandy, crème de cocoa (dark), and cream. Before we launched this blog I didn’t know there was such a thing as crème de cocoa so I was doubly surprised to learn that there were two different kinds.  They are the Ebony and Ivory of liqueurs.  The dark one turned out to be much thicker than the white and it had a richer chocolate flavor.  I am still talking about crème de cocoa.

The Lover’s Kiss drink also features cherry brandy and we used Clear Creek Distillery's Kirschwasser. According to their web site it has a "feline delicacy of cherry flavor robed in manageable spirit that plays like a string quartet".  First off, I don't know what the hell that even means.  Secondly, if I saw "feline delicacy" on a menu, I would reconsider where I chose to eat.  Finally, my feline isn't that delicate, unless pooping on the floor counts as delicate.  Where I come from, we consider it indelicate.  Regardless, we tried the Kirschwasser  straight and did not think it had a feline delicacy.   It mostly tasted like burning.

After tasting the Kirschwasser we had low expectations for this drink, but we were pleasantly surprised.  It had a nice chocolate flavor with a hint of cherry.  I don't know if the cherry flavor came from the Kirschwasser or from excess juice from the cherry garnish but either way it was a nice touch.  The maraschino cherry symbolizes the bright red lips of your lover, if your lover is a harlot. For the second straight night, our drink was topped with the widely acknowledged two most romantic foods: whipped cream and chocolate jimmies. Serve it in a champagne flute and your partner will know you have class.



I didn't have an idea for a second photo
so here is a bunny with a pancake on its head

 Originally I was going to recap the Romance Week 2011 drinks but considering that we already have a list, that would be repetitive.  Then I thought I could give some last minute romance tips, but all I really know is that you should listen to your partner, show her that you are thinking about her, and don't be an ass.  When are an ass anyway, apologize.  There is probably better advice, but that's all I got.  Anyway, by the time Valentine’s Day rolls around I would imagine most people are tired of reading romance tips the same way I am tired of stories about how busy the day is for florists, the magical powers of chocolate, or 10 ideas for a romantic gift.  It is the same crap recycled year after year by lazy writers.

We promise not to use those tactics during Romance Week 2012.

Overall Rating for the Lover’s Kiss

Taste: 3

Presentation: 4

Ease of Preparation: 3 - It is hard to get whipped cream into a champagne flute

Drinks Until Blackout: 6 – 18% alcohol

Romance Score: 4

Ingredients

.5 oz Amaretto

.5 oz Cherry-flavored Brandy

.5 oz Crème de Cocoa (Brown)

1 oz cream

Day 38: Fail-y Irish Cream

Romance Bear will be disappointed

While Mr. Bottle sleeps, Mrs. Bottle here to discuss today’s drink. The penultimate beverage from this week’s tribute to Romance is called Death by Chocolate. It is a mixture of crushed ice, Irish cream liqueur, Crème de Cocoa (the brown kind), vodka and chocolate ice cream. I have to admit that I was giddy with excitement about today’s drink and my expectations were soaring through the clouds. Bailey’s? Like it. Crème de Cocoa? Mmmm. Chocolate ice cream? Nom nom nom. Then my expectations jumped from the plane without a parachute.

First, I’d like to propose a new name for this drink. The ratio of Bailey’s to the rest of the ingredients actually resulted in a frozen concoction I’d like to call the Languishing Coma by Bailey’s. I thought I liked Bailey’s, but not when I expect to taste chocolate and I get nothing. Even the Cool Whip and chocolate jimmies on top couldn’t help much. This did not put me or Mr. Bottle in a very romantic mood. His first sip resulted in the subtle statement “I don’t like this at all”. While I agreed, I kept thinking it would get better if I mixed in all that Cool Whip and added even more jimmies. No such luck.

Relationships this special
are usually found in Tijuana

This led me to question my belief in the tastiness of Bailey’s. While I very much detest all alcohol websites for reasons others have already blogged about, I tentatively ventured to Bailey’s site. First, I give kudos to them for not adding some awful flash and loud music to their site. But I did learn that what makes Bailey’s so special is the Irish milk from the Irish cows that apparently are the happiest cows in the world. So many questions here: Who interviewed all the cows in the world? And how did they actually talk to all the cows? How do Irish cows know that it’s better in Ireland? Seems like if I were a cow, I’d prefer India. I also learned that the whiskey and the cream in Bailey’s have a special relationship. A “special” relationship?? This doesn’t sound romantic at all.

My recommendation: Get a chocolate milkshake and add vodka for a romantic relationship.

Overall Rating for Death By Chocolate

Taste: 2 - We signed up for some chocolate-y goodness not Bailey’s meh-ness
Presentation: 4 - Chocolate jimmies are worth at least a point
Ease of Preparation: 2 - Required a blender
Drinks Until Blackout: 10 – 7% alcohol
Romance Score: 2

Ingredients

1 oz Irish Cream Liqueur
.5 oz Crème de Cocoa (Dark)
.5 oz Vodka
1 scoop Chocolate Ice Cream

Day 37: Beaches and Prose

Romance Week continues and today we have Sex on the Beach, a favorite drink of 21 year-old college students.  It is a shooter made with vodka, black raspberry liqueur, melon liqueur, pineapple juice, and cranberry juice. This drink is pretty visually unappealing.  It looks a lot like dirty water.  The taste is what you might expect, a fruit bomb.  Mrs. Bottle thought the melon dominated the drink and for her that is a big minus.  I agreed that it had a very strong melon flavor, but I could also taste the pineapple juice.  The black raspberry and cranberry didn’t fight their way through at all and the vodka was completely undetectable. The absence of alcohol notes is another reason it is popular with 21 year-olds.

Romance Bear is presumptuous



Suave



Sex on the Beach scores pretty low on the romance scale as well.  As previously noted, shooters are not the epitome of class.  I have nothing against shooters in general, but you rarely see people having a quiet candlelight dinner ordering a round of Alabama Slammers.  You might hide an engagement ring in a champagne flute, but you would never put the ring in a shot glass unless you are confident in your Heimlich skills.  The name Sex on the Beach doesn’t ooze romance either.  We all know that romance can and should lead to physical love, but why be so overt?  There are places where such crassness is considered romantic, though.  These places are primarily in New Jersey.

If I were going to take the easy way out, this section would contain more cheap jokes about sex on the beach leading to sand where you don’t want it or being careful to look out for crabs, lol. Instead, we are going to answer a question I found on the web:

Has anyone had sex on the beach is it romantic?

Hey my name is Kandi and I'm 18 :-) I've been seeing this handsome guy for three months he is older 37. He wants to take me to the beach to have a romantic night together. I was thinking blankets, wine, dinner, and candles. Also can you get in trouble if anyone sees. The beach that we are going to usually has a lot of cops around I don't know why

Dear Kandi,

A) You should not have sex until you are married, otherwise you might get a reputation

B)  Is this beach in Dubai?  If so, you should pass.

C) It’s too bad you are already 18 or you could ditch that 37 year old for Mark Sanchez.  Maybe you could lie about your age.

D) You should skip the sex, you will get sand where you don’t want it.

Sincerely,

Mr. Bottle

Overall Rating for Sex on the Beach

Taste: 2
Presentation: 1
Ease of Preparation: 3
Drinks Until Blackout: 7 – 15% alcohol
Romance Score: 1

Ingredients

.5 oz Vodka
.5 oz Black Raspberry Liqueur
.5 oz Melon Liqueur
1 oz Pineapple Juice
.25 oz Cranberry Juice