An online speakeasy of potent potables and other pabulam.

I’m not talking about the eponymous martini variation that utilizes the cocktail onion but rather the new bar not far from Cork and Marvin.? The Gibson only opened this past Wednesday.

It was one of those random Saturdays – I had absolutely nothing planned to do.? It was kind of weird, in fact.? I mentioned such a fact on Facebook and heard from Jake.? After a while we decided to head down to The Gibson, but since it didn’t open until 6 PM we swung by Cork to visit Tom Brown.? I’d only been there once, but Tom had left early that time.

You’ve seen Marshall’s, so I guess it’s my turn.? For those of you paying attention, if you’re looking at the banner, I’m the guy on the right.? EDIT FOR CLARIFICATION: As with his, this is from Darcy and Art of Drink.

Instructions:

1) Copy this list into your blog, with instructions.
2) Bold all the drinks you?ve imbibed.
3) Cross out any items that you won?t touch
4) Post a comment here and? link to your results.

OR

If you don?t have a blog, just count the ones you?ve tried and post the number in the comments section.

List of Drinks You Must Try Before You Expire

1. Manhattan Cocktail
2. Kopi Luwak (Weasle Coffee)
3. French / Swiss Absinthe
4. Rootbeer
5. Gin Martini
6. Sauternes
7. Whole Milk
8. Tequila (100% Agave)
9. XO Cognac
10. Espresso
11. Spring Water (directly from the spring)
12. Gin & Tonic
13. Mead
14. Westvleteren 12 (Yellow Cap) Trappist Ale
15. Chateau d?Yquem
16. Budwieser
17. Maraschino Liqueur
18. Mojito
19. Orgeat
20. Grand Marnier
21. Mai Tai (original)
22. Ice Wine (Canadian)
23. Red Bull
24. Fresh Squeezed Orange Juice
25. Bubble Tea
26. Tokaj
27. Chicory
28. Islay Scotch
29. Pusser?s Navy Rum
30. Fernet Branca
31. Fresh Pressed Apple Cider
32. Bourbon
33. Australian Shiraz
34. Buckley?s Cough Syrup
35. Orange Bitters
36. Margarita (classic recipe)
37. Molasses & Milk
38. Chimay Blue
39. Wine of Pines
40. Green Tea
41. Daiginjo Sake
42. Chai Tea
43. Vodka (chilled, straight)
44. Coca-Cola
45. Zombie (Beachcomber recipe)
46. Barley Wine
47. Brewed Choclate (Xocolatl)
48. Pisco Sour
49. Lemonade
50. Speyside Single Malt
51. Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee
52. Champagne (Vintage)
53. Ros? (French)
54. Bellini
55. Caipirinha
56. White Zinfandel (Blush)
57. Coconut Water
58. Cerveza
59. Cafe au Lait
60. Ice Tea
61. Pedro Ximenez Sherry
62. Vintage Port
63. Hot Chocolate
64. German Riesling
65. Pina Colada
66. El Dorado 15 Year Rum
67. Chartreuse
68. Greek Wine
69. Negroni
70. J?germeister
71. Chicha
72. Guiness
73. Rhum Agricole
74. Palm Wine
75. Soju
76. Ceylon Tea (High Grown)
77. Belgian Lambic
78. Mongolian Airag
79. Doogh, Lassi or Ayran
80. Sugarcane Juice
81. Ramos Gin Fizz
82. Singapore Sling
83. Mint Julep
84. Old Fashioned
85. Perique
86. Jenever (Holland Gin)
87. Chocolate Milkshake
88. Traditional Italian Barolo
89. Pulque
90. Natural Sparkling Water
91. Cuban Rum
92. Asti Spumante
93. Irish Whiskey
94. Ch?teau Margaux
95. Two Buck Chuck
96. Screech
97. Akvavit
98. Rye Whisky
99. German Weissbier
100. Daiquiri (classic)
     

So that puts me at a 79 out of 100.? Not bad.? I’ve heard of Barolo but never tried it.? Perique is something I’ve been wanting to get and haven’t been able to find.? I don’t know about Pulque or Chicha, but maybe I’ll hit a Hispanic market around here.? The various rums are easy – yes, I’d like to try them.? Some of these, like the cough syrup and the Screech – seem to be fairly uniquely Canadian.? The Chateau Margaux is probably too expensive for me.

Mongolian fermented horse milk?? Yikes.? Same with the weasel coffee, but I’d probably try one of each just to say I had.

Aryan?? Sure, what the heck.

The wines?? Oh, sure, what’s the worst that could happen.

I’m pretty certain I’ve had the Ceylon Tea.

Who wants to send me some Perique?

1.? I failed to do a Mixology Monday post this month for the first time in ages.? My apologies to Pegu Doug, who had a good idea – but after spending the entire weekend basically wiped out, it just couldn’t happen.

Sorry.

2.? Congratulations to mbrownerhamlin, who won the TDN from about two weeks ago (Irish whiskey) for his Knacker’s Conference.? If you see this before I get ahold of you, shoot me an e-mail with your address and your choice of prize.

3.? REPEAL DAY!? December 5th is the 75th anniversary of the repeal of Prohibition.? There’s going to be a bunch of super awesome bartenders there, plus cool folks Tony Abou-Ganim and Jeffrey Morgenthaler and others, and tickets are $80 before November 20th, and $90 after.? You can get them via the DC Craft Bartender’s Guild or RepealDay.org.

Thanks to some kind of lame excuse that I couldn’t be bothered to remember, Kaiser Penguin had to relinquish control of Thursday Drink Night this week.? Laughing maniacally, I seized the opportunity to run it with an iron fist in an iron glove, only if by iron you mean “flabby white flesh”, but also to use the week to try the theme of “Irish whiskey”.

If I’m doing shots at a bar, it seems like they’re almost inevitably Jameson’s.? Part of that is that I hang out with my neighbor Conroy a lot and he loves him some Jameson’s (and Redbreast, which I introduced him to).? The other part is that as a shot, it’s a smooth whiskey to drink.? I could drink a ton more of those than I could of, say, Southern Comfort (a shot that almost put paid to your humble narrator last weekend in Pittsburgh when he was trying to get a SoCo shirt for a rather drunk guy in his party) or Jim Beam (which I haven’t been able to stand since I drank a handle of it on a bus ride from Charlottesville to Miami for a bowl game, but that’s a story for another day).

Conroy pointed out to me the other day, however, that there are very few cocktails seem to use the Irish whiskey.? Sure, you have some, a few of which are just variations on drinks using other whiskeys, but I wanted to see what the mixologists on TDN came up with.

We started with one from someone (Will) in my Wednesday night cocktail class, a drink he called the Irish Ambien.

Irish Ambien
1 oz. Irish whiskey
1 oz. vanilla vodka
1 oz. Bailey’s Irish cream
Shake and strain into a cocktail glass

First “real” drink of the night was from jimmyp – and it’ll be after the cut.