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The Undrinkable Cocktail
Aug. 10th, 2005 10:10 amhttp://www.dailylush.com/archives/the_undrinkable_cocktail.html
These alcoholic beverages may not kill you, but you'll wish they had
Bad cocktails
IF THERE IS ONE THING we at Daily Lush have found to be an absolute in the world of alcohol, it is this: You can take anything, mix a little sugar and yeast into it, and if it ferments there will be somebody to drink it. Try it yourself. Ferment some horse milk and see if Mongolians don’t show up at your door to drink the foul-smelling fluid, which they call airag. You could even let a fish ferment — the Swedes will eat it and call it surstromming.
What follows is our list of the world’s ghastliest alcoholic beverages. Some are simply revolting, some legitimately poisonous. Snobs take note: the next time you sneer at a fellow drinker for his choice of bottom shelf liquor or cheap rice wine, remember that somewhere in the world, someone is happily intoxicating themselves with something far worse.
Army worm wine: In 2001, Ray Reigstad, an amateur wine maker in Northern Minnesota, decided to brew up 11-gallons of white wine. Northern Minnesota is not particularly known for its wine grapes, but that didn’t matter to Reigstad, as he wasn’t planning to use grapes anyway. Instead, he planned to use something that already grew in abundance in the Northland: the forest tent caterpillar, commonly called the army worm. Reigstad had heard about the recipe from a coworker who claimed his grandfather made it, and the winemaker saw a peculiar logic in using the insects as an ingredient for winemaking. “Army worms eat leaves,” he told the Duluth News Tribune. “So essentially they’re a combination of fruit and flowers.” Reigstad offered the wine to local connoisseurs without first telling them what they were drinking, and the results were unanimously positive. “If I was looking for a wine made from larvae, I’d choose this,” one later said. According to drinkers of the wine, it is sweet and unexpectedly similar to grape wine; Reigstad recommends drinking it with Walleye.
Bone beer: There’s a little known, although once common, funerary practice called “mortuary cannibalism,” in which a recently deceased body is consumed by family, friends, and tribe. Anthropologists sometimes refer to this as “compassionate cannibalism” — and not without controversy — but the logic of the practice is neatly summed up by a quote often attributed to the Cocomo Indians of Peru, who are said to have explained to Missionaries that it was “better to be inside a friend than to be swallowed up in the cold Earth.” Mortuary cannibalism has been well-documented in South America — in particular, the eating of the bones of the dead, properly called osteophagy. Mind you, South American tribes didn’t simply de-bone their loved ones and begin gnawing on their ulnas. Instead, they ground the bones and concocted complex meals with them, including mixing them with honey, cooking them into soups, and brewing them into manioc beer. By the way, for those of you who don’t mind the thought of a hint of corpse in your beer, it should also be pointed out that the traditional process of brewing manioc beer was to have women of the tribe mash up the manioc root, chew the mash, and then spit it into a bowl to ferment.
Canned Heat: “You know,” bluesman Tommy Johnson sang in 1929, “canned heat killing me.” Canned heat, after all, is a popular nickname for one of history’s most murderous alcoholic beverages: Sterno. A jellied mix of ethyl and methyl alcohol intended to be used as fuel for a portable stove, Sterno has often been the last-ditch drink of choice for hobos and bowery alcoholics, who converted the gel into a drink (sometimes called “squeeze” or “pink lady”) by heating it over a fire and squeezing it through a sock. Because canned heat has a high quantity of methyl alcohol, the same stuff used in antifreeze, it has killed or blinded untold number of desperate alcoholics. As to the taste? According to literature about Skid Row alcoholics, some found Canned Heat so unpalatable that they took to sniffing rubbing alcohol instead.
Pruno: Jarvis Masters, a resident a San Quentin’s death row who has also made a name for himself as an author and poet, provided a recipe for pruno in 1992. The details of brewing this prison house cocktail is intertwined with Master’s own death sentence. “Pour the remaining portion into two 18 oz. Cups,” Masters writes. “May God have mercy on your soul.” Masters isn’t kidding about pruno, either: this contraband alcoholic mash of fruit, sugar, and ketchup, cooked up in a baggie, can be deadly if fermented wrong. Come to think of it, the stuff —which has been described as tasting like alcoholic vomit — can be deadly even if brewed right. In December of 2003, two inmates of Los Angeles’ Men’s Central Jail beat a third inmate to death in his cell. They were drunk on pruno at the time.
Sour-Toe Cocktail: Visitors to the Yukon desiring a truly abominable potable might swing by the Dawson’s Downtown Hotel, the only place where you can enjoy the Sour-Toe Cocktail. The alcoholic content is up to you, but the drink comes with a special garnish: a human toe. The original toe belonged to a gold miner who reputably lost it to frostbite, but was accidentally swallowed after 700 servings; through the years, any number of toes have been lost to accidental ingestion and theft. Upon request, the bar now produces a chest filled with pickled human toes, although they will discreetly demure from explaining the source of their human remains. The bar offers a souvenir certificates to those who let the toe touch their lips while drinking.
Three-Penis Wine: A traditional Chinese remedy consisting of powder made from the penises of dogs, deer, and seal mixed into wine. This noxious mixture is reputed to provide a number of health benefits, not the least of which is enhancing the libido. A seal pizzle can sell for as much as $650, so this cocktail can be quite expensive, even if the contents are often fraudulent: A Canadian sampling of the DNA of seal penises in Toronto shops found that all but one were from other animals, mostly dogs, and that many of them weren’t even penises! For the more daring — or desperate — five-penis and nine-penis variations are available. (Max Sparber)
These alcoholic beverages may not kill you, but you'll wish they had
Bad cocktails
IF THERE IS ONE THING we at Daily Lush have found to be an absolute in the world of alcohol, it is this: You can take anything, mix a little sugar and yeast into it, and if it ferments there will be somebody to drink it. Try it yourself. Ferment some horse milk and see if Mongolians don’t show up at your door to drink the foul-smelling fluid, which they call airag. You could even let a fish ferment — the Swedes will eat it and call it surstromming.
What follows is our list of the world’s ghastliest alcoholic beverages. Some are simply revolting, some legitimately poisonous. Snobs take note: the next time you sneer at a fellow drinker for his choice of bottom shelf liquor or cheap rice wine, remember that somewhere in the world, someone is happily intoxicating themselves with something far worse.
Army worm wine: In 2001, Ray Reigstad, an amateur wine maker in Northern Minnesota, decided to brew up 11-gallons of white wine. Northern Minnesota is not particularly known for its wine grapes, but that didn’t matter to Reigstad, as he wasn’t planning to use grapes anyway. Instead, he planned to use something that already grew in abundance in the Northland: the forest tent caterpillar, commonly called the army worm. Reigstad had heard about the recipe from a coworker who claimed his grandfather made it, and the winemaker saw a peculiar logic in using the insects as an ingredient for winemaking. “Army worms eat leaves,” he told the Duluth News Tribune. “So essentially they’re a combination of fruit and flowers.” Reigstad offered the wine to local connoisseurs without first telling them what they were drinking, and the results were unanimously positive. “If I was looking for a wine made from larvae, I’d choose this,” one later said. According to drinkers of the wine, it is sweet and unexpectedly similar to grape wine; Reigstad recommends drinking it with Walleye.
Bone beer: There’s a little known, although once common, funerary practice called “mortuary cannibalism,” in which a recently deceased body is consumed by family, friends, and tribe. Anthropologists sometimes refer to this as “compassionate cannibalism” — and not without controversy — but the logic of the practice is neatly summed up by a quote often attributed to the Cocomo Indians of Peru, who are said to have explained to Missionaries that it was “better to be inside a friend than to be swallowed up in the cold Earth.” Mortuary cannibalism has been well-documented in South America — in particular, the eating of the bones of the dead, properly called osteophagy. Mind you, South American tribes didn’t simply de-bone their loved ones and begin gnawing on their ulnas. Instead, they ground the bones and concocted complex meals with them, including mixing them with honey, cooking them into soups, and brewing them into manioc beer. By the way, for those of you who don’t mind the thought of a hint of corpse in your beer, it should also be pointed out that the traditional process of brewing manioc beer was to have women of the tribe mash up the manioc root, chew the mash, and then spit it into a bowl to ferment.
Canned Heat: “You know,” bluesman Tommy Johnson sang in 1929, “canned heat killing me.” Canned heat, after all, is a popular nickname for one of history’s most murderous alcoholic beverages: Sterno. A jellied mix of ethyl and methyl alcohol intended to be used as fuel for a portable stove, Sterno has often been the last-ditch drink of choice for hobos and bowery alcoholics, who converted the gel into a drink (sometimes called “squeeze” or “pink lady”) by heating it over a fire and squeezing it through a sock. Because canned heat has a high quantity of methyl alcohol, the same stuff used in antifreeze, it has killed or blinded untold number of desperate alcoholics. As to the taste? According to literature about Skid Row alcoholics, some found Canned Heat so unpalatable that they took to sniffing rubbing alcohol instead.
Pruno: Jarvis Masters, a resident a San Quentin’s death row who has also made a name for himself as an author and poet, provided a recipe for pruno in 1992. The details of brewing this prison house cocktail is intertwined with Master’s own death sentence. “Pour the remaining portion into two 18 oz. Cups,” Masters writes. “May God have mercy on your soul.” Masters isn’t kidding about pruno, either: this contraband alcoholic mash of fruit, sugar, and ketchup, cooked up in a baggie, can be deadly if fermented wrong. Come to think of it, the stuff —which has been described as tasting like alcoholic vomit — can be deadly even if brewed right. In December of 2003, two inmates of Los Angeles’ Men’s Central Jail beat a third inmate to death in his cell. They were drunk on pruno at the time.
Sour-Toe Cocktail: Visitors to the Yukon desiring a truly abominable potable might swing by the Dawson’s Downtown Hotel, the only place where you can enjoy the Sour-Toe Cocktail. The alcoholic content is up to you, but the drink comes with a special garnish: a human toe. The original toe belonged to a gold miner who reputably lost it to frostbite, but was accidentally swallowed after 700 servings; through the years, any number of toes have been lost to accidental ingestion and theft. Upon request, the bar now produces a chest filled with pickled human toes, although they will discreetly demure from explaining the source of their human remains. The bar offers a souvenir certificates to those who let the toe touch their lips while drinking.
Three-Penis Wine: A traditional Chinese remedy consisting of powder made from the penises of dogs, deer, and seal mixed into wine. This noxious mixture is reputed to provide a number of health benefits, not the least of which is enhancing the libido. A seal pizzle can sell for as much as $650, so this cocktail can be quite expensive, even if the contents are often fraudulent: A Canadian sampling of the DNA of seal penises in Toronto shops found that all but one were from other animals, mostly dogs, and that many of them weren’t even penises! For the more daring — or desperate — five-penis and nine-penis variations are available. (Max Sparber)
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