It's always five o'clock somewhere

I didn't drink for 5 days and then smashed 27oz of wine and two double Johnnie Walker Blacks last night.
 
5 negronis, 2/3 pint of peroni, 1 glass of champagne and 2 double jamesons. I'd say that's proper day of drinking.
 
fxh said:
Why spoil life by drinking Peroni?
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Because she ordered Peroni and it was too big for her to finish before walking over to the rail station so I gave her a head start.
 
Fullers 1845, bottle-conditioned strong ale. Well regarded. £2 for 500 ml bottle. Four for £6 in Waitrose. With Waitrose £4 voucher on bills over £20 works out at £1.25 a bottle. A steal. Mix in Fullers London Porter for variety if you like, same deal. Not session beers or even summer beers.
 
Read an interesting report on drinking in France. One litre of wine per meal recommended medical limit not so long ago.

More interesting was school kids were allowed half a litre of wine with meals in 1956. Alcohol for school kids only banned in 1980.

Britain was reasonably enlightened regarding children’s drinking in my youth. Kids not allowed in pubs, so they were proper grown up venues. However teenagers could get served fairly easily in pubs if they behaved themselves. Get the tallest kid to go to the bar. Beer was not that strong and youngsters were not taking drugs.

https://www.france24.com/en/2019032...ign-daily-intake-wine-french-culture-drinking
 
Kingstonian said:
Fullers 1845, bottle-conditioned strong ale. Well regarded. £2 for 500 ml bottle. Four for £6 in Waitrose. With Waitrose £4 voucher on bills over £20 works out at £1.25 a bottle. A steal. Mix in Fullers London Porter for variety if you like, same deal. Not session beers or even summer beers.
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Very summer like. Discounts on alcohol to encourage vice.

Kingstonian said:
Read an interesting report on drinking in France. One litre of wine per meal recommended medical limit not so long ago.

More interesting was school kids were allowed half a litre of wine with meals in 1956. Alcohol for school kids only banned in 1980.

Britain was reasonably enlightened regarding children’s drinking in my youth. Kids not allowed in pubs, so they were proper grown up venues. However teenagers could get served fairly easily in pubs if they behaved themselves. Get the tallest kid to go to the bar. Beer was not that strong and youngsters were not taking drugs.

https://www.france24.com/en/2019032...ign-daily-intake-wine-french-culture-drinking
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Somewhere in this forum I cited a study where peak alcohol consumption in UK ended a decade or so ago. Subsequent younger millennial and I assume Gen Z now are tee total.
 
Kingstonian said:
Read an interesting report on drinking in France. One litre of wine per meal recommended medical limit not so long ago.

More interesting was school kids were allowed half a litre of wine with meals in 1956. Alcohol for school kids only banned in 1980.

Britain was reasonably enlightened regarding children’s drinking in my youth. Kids not allowed in pubs, so they were proper grown up venues. However teenagers could get served fairly easily in pubs if they behaved themselves. Get the tallest kid to go to the bar. Beer was not that strong and youngsters were not taking drugs.

https://www.france24.com/en/2019032...ign-daily-intake-wine-french-culture-drinking
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Also the old bar section of the pubs, as opposed to the lounge were strictly a male and working class preserve. And cheaper ale too. You could still get Mild when I started drinking almost everywhere.

I was frequenting pubs a couple of months before my 16 birthday and pretty much every Friday and Saturday night and whilst I might have been a bit earlier than most, it wasn't unusual and was pretty much accepted as a rite of passage that you would go out and get pissed.

We Brits are pretty much up there with the traditional Russkies for tolerance and alcohol abuse. We can do it as good as anyone.
 
Fwiffo said:
Is that something to be proud of?
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If you can hold your ale, perhaps yes.

2 premium gins on the go, Copperhead's Gibson addition with a dash of genever thrown in at the distillery:

copperhead-gin-the-gibson-edition-gin.jpg


And this Finnish one:

napue-gin.jpg
 
I woke up yesterday at 515 to do my bus commute to work. There were bus issues on the return leg and I ended up being back by 2000 instead of 1930 so I was late meeting my mate and his girlfriend.

Had 3 Manhattans and a brandy at a wine bar with some live blues musicians. Whilst they took breaks I was chatting up our lovely waitress and bartender at the back. It's 2300 and my mate's dozing off in front of the performers so I have to get the cheque.

We went next to play foosball, street fighter, pinball and some light gun games. 2 double Jameson.

Went to a club next and had a double Jameson but my mate's girl didn't like the scene.

Popped over next door to an old bartender I knew and ordered a bottle of champagne and some more brandy. It's 230 when we finish so we decide to go to Chinatown for dim sum and I staggered home after 4.

I'm wrecked today. I barely made it over to see my barber at 11.
 
Kingstonian said:
Dim sum is usually an afternoon thing in London Chinatown.

Are you in Toronto? Spadina Avenue?
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Dim sum is a brunch/lunch thing. We were at Rol San on Spadina. There was a queue to get in and barely any of the customers at that time were Chinese. It's infamous at that hour for catering to the post industry and post clubbing crowd.

Dining options at 3 in the area was a diner, Rol San or Swatow, Pho Pasteur, or random shawarma chains.
 
Kingstonian said:
Toronto must be nice at this time of the year. Everyone out and about enjoying the weather.
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It was 30c yesterday. Reckon it should hit 40c in another month. Of course the same people who were moaning it wasn't even 12c in April are moaning again.
 
Fwiffo said:
I woke up yesterday at 515 to do my bus commute to work. There were bus issues on the return leg and I ended up being back by 2000 instead of 1930 so I was late meeting my mate and his girlfriend.

Had 3 Manhattans and a brandy at a wine bar with some live blues musicians. Whilst they took breaks I was chatting up our lovely waitress and bartender at the back. It's 2300 and my mate's dozing off in front of the performers so I have to get the cheque.

We went next to play foosball, street fighter, pinball and some light gun games. 2 double Jameson.

Went to a club next and had a double Jameson but my mate's girl didn't like the scene.

Popped over next door to an old bartender I knew and ordered a bottle of champagne and some more brandy. It's 230 when we finish so we decide to go to Chinatown for dim sum and I staggered home after 4.

I'm wrecked today. I barely made it over to see my barber at 11.
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Some bad drink combinations there, a drinking man should be wise to such obvious mistakes.

If you had inserted a Chinese meal before the foosball and stuff, I reckon you'd have been fit as fiddle in the morning.
 
Pimpernel Smith said:
Some bad drink combinations there, a drinking man should be wise to such obvious mistakes.

If you had inserted a Chinese meal before the foosball and stuff, I reckon you'd have been fit as fiddle in the morning.
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Since my boss was in on Monday and later subsequently flew out I had been boozing all week so that might have had a detrimental effect (at least 2 nights I got to bed after midnight). I honestly thought the blues bar was the last stop and the cocktails were a point of conversation so I could speak to the waitress/bartender one on one in the back. Plus my mate and his girl were already a few in from another whisky bar. That said when I laid down the challenge of 4am they wanted to respond. At least she did because last time she was completely sloshed in front of me in the pub after a footy game. Or maybe it was a carnival.

I had "back bacon" which looked like glorified prepackaged ham that morning for breakfast and some roasted potatoes at a free hotel breakfast. Then for lunch I flipped between a greek salad with chicken breast to chicken fingers and fries. An impending rainstorm meant I ate the chicken and left the potato behind. One of my staff gave me one sliver of kit kat and I decided to order smoked salmon on latkes instead of a full meal at the wine bar. I was remarkably sturdy without a lot of sustenance.

The last bar specializes in whiskys and has champagne by the glass so that's why sparkling was an easy choice.

I certainly can't be out and about for 23 hours like I used to.
 
After my Friday night of debauchery I restarted drinking again on Tuesday. 2 glasses of 9 oz pinot grigio, 2 double Johnnie Walker black. I really didn't need the last one but the bartender insisted.
 
Today's family meal was lunch at my aunt's house. As I have been shifting residences and living out of a travel bag for work this year I dropped off my alcohol collection at my aunt's place for Christmas and safekeeping. My aunt told me a few times my cousins came over and wanted to imbibe. Today I open the liquor cabinet and find my Chivas Royal Salute 21 is gone. I'm down to one XO cognac. I have an equal number of Irish whiskeys to Scottish whiskys. In the place of the missing bottles are St. Remy, something called Gibson's and a few other cheap brands that someone either brought over or was kind enough to "replace" my spent collection with.
 
This Navy strength gin at 57.5%, way too strong for quaffing with tonic, too minerally to be taken seriously as a pink gin:

dg00039.jpg
 
Noticed that Don Papa ''rum'' is flooding the market here, having exhausted other countries to exploit, the initial hit of glycerol and vanilla essence is actually quite charming, but after that.....

thefatrumpirate.com

Don Papa No.7 Small Batch Rum - thefatrumpirate.com

Don Papa No.7 Small Batch Rum. This is how the Bleeding Heart Company who produce Don Papa are marketing this version of their very popular Don Papa Rum.
thefatrumpirate.com thefatrumpirate.com
 
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I am not a big rum drinker. I prefer Navy rum - Woods and Lambs. That said, I also like Stroh Austrian rum which is a nice cold weather drink during the ski season.

Otherwise whatever rum in a cocktail on holiday for drinking abroad.
 
Kingstonian said:
I am not a big rum drinker. I prefer Navy rum - Woods and Lambs. That said, I also like Stroh Austrian rum which is a nice cold weather drink during the ski season.

Otherwise whatever rum in a cocktail on holiday for drinking abroad.
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Pusser's is a good Navy rum too.
 
Gin sales double in the U.K. as interest surges among millennials

"In Britain, where the drink was first popularized more than 300 years ago, gin sales have nearly doubled in the last two years to a record £2.2-billion ($3.5-billion) and the number of brands has jumped from around 20 to close to 1,000. Similar trends have been seen across much of Europe and Asia, as well as Canada where gin sales climbed 11.2 per cent in 2018. Last week the world’s largest spirits maker, Diageo PLC, hailed a “gin-aisance” after reporting that its best performing products during the last fiscal year, which ended on June 30, were Gordon’s and Tanqueray, which had together a 22 per cent increase in global sales.

Indeed young drinkers have been imbibing gin like never before, intrigued by the myriad of flavours and the ever-widening variety of cocktails. More than half of British drinkers between the ages of 18 and 24 drink gin, according to market research firm Kantar. That’s up from 43 per cent four years ago.

It’s quite a turnaround for a drink that was once blamed for so many social ills in the 1700s it was nearly banned in Britain. Even in recent times, a gin and tonic with lime was considered a pleasant if boring drink. That began to change in the 1990s after the advent of Bombay Sapphire and it’s trendy blue-tinted bottle. Then in 1999, Lesley Gracie, a master distiller at Scotland’s Hendrick’s Gin, broke the mould completely by creating a gin with rose and cucumber essences. Ms. Gracie’s recipe was the first to move away from juniper-heavy gins that all tasted roughly the same, and it sparked a revolution that continues today."

That's it. It shows I'm a man of the 2000s and not 2010s as I'm interested in big and brown. I always thought the chap who came around to introduce Sipsmith over here said it was them who started the gin craze by applying for a licence to distill gin - first since Beefeater in the 19th century.
 
Fwiffo said:
Gin sales double in the U.K. as interest surges among millennials

"In Britain, where the drink was first popularized more than 300 years ago, gin sales have nearly doubled in the last two years to a record £2.2-billion ($3.5-billion) and the number of brands has jumped from around 20 to close to 1,000. Similar trends have been seen across much of Europe and Asia, as well as Canada where gin sales climbed 11.2 per cent in 2018. Last week the world’s largest spirits maker, Diageo PLC, hailed a “gin-aisance” after reporting that its best performing products during the last fiscal year, which ended on June 30, were Gordon’s and Tanqueray, which had together a 22 per cent increase in global sales.

Indeed young drinkers have been imbibing gin like never before, intrigued by the myriad of flavours and the ever-widening variety of cocktails. More than half of British drinkers between the ages of 18 and 24 drink gin, according to market research firm Kantar. That’s up from 43 per cent four years ago.

It’s quite a turnaround for a drink that was once blamed for so many social ills in the 1700s it was nearly banned in Britain. Even in recent times, a gin and tonic with lime was considered a pleasant if boring drink. That began to change in the 1990s after the advent of Bombay Sapphire and it’s trendy blue-tinted bottle. Then in 1999, Lesley Gracie, a master distiller at Scotland’s Hendrick’s Gin, broke the mould completely by creating a gin with rose and cucumber essences. Ms. Gracie’s recipe was the first to move away from juniper-heavy gins that all tasted roughly the same, and it sparked a revolution that continues today."

That's it. It shows I'm a man of the 2000s and not 2010s as I'm interested in big and brown. I always thought the chap who came around to introduce Sipsmith over here said it was them who started the gin craze by applying for a licence to distill gin - first since Beefeater in the 19th century.
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Gordon's been a dreadful gin since they reduced the alcohol content at the end of 80s.

When I first came over here if you asked for G&T they didn't know what it was. Probably because their own spirit, the more malty genever, is meant with some exceptions to be taken neat, or as a hand-banger with a beer chaser. They know what G&T is now though.
 
Agree about Gordon’s. Someone will say they offer a stronger version but that’s not the point. It’s a matter of principle.

Gin is widespread because it is easy to manufacture. So every Tom, Dick and Harry is now offering their own ‘small batch, craft’ version.
 
If it's a matter of principle what about the various alcohol percentages of single malt whisky. That ought to be regulated.

There was a subsection about Fevertree sales.
 
Kingstonian said:
Agree about Gordon’s. Someone will say they offer a stronger version but that’s not the point. It’s a matter of principle.

Gin is widespread because it is easy to manufacture. So every Tom, Dick and Harry is now offering their own ‘small batch, craft’ version.
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You don't even need a still, just buy the raw spirit in and throw in juniper and some other botanicals for 24 hours or so and away you go: boutique gin at premium price.

Fwiffo said:
If it's a matter of principle what about the various alcohol percentages of single malt whisky. That ought to be regulated.

There was a subsection about Fevertree sales.
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It's not a matter of principle, it's a fact that Gordan's deteriorated when they reduced the alchohol content, it lost something on the palate and is a bit more musty compared with the crisp clean taste of Beefeater.
 
It is still a matter of principle for me. It was a cost cutting measure masquerading as an improvement. Whisky is different because strength is clearly advised and leading blends have not pulled a similar stroke with a 37.5% offering. Non age statement is the whisky trick.
 
Macallan changed their age statements to lyrical grades here. After a few years of higher prices and I presume declining sales, I remember seeing a sales rep come out to say they will put age statements on again.

I was also at a Macallan tasting when a rep introduced the lyrical grades.

A lot of single malts use colour agents similar to Coca Cola to give a consistent colour. Glenfiddich. Others chill filter.
 
Fwiffo said:
Macallan changed their age statements to lyrical grades here. After a few years of higher prices and I presume declining sales, I remember seeing a sales rep come out to say they will put age statements on again.

I was also at a Macallan tasting when a rep introduced the lyrical grades.

A lot of single malts use colour agents similar to Coca Cola to give a consistent colour. Glenfiddich. Others chill filter.
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They use caramel E150, it's supposed to interfere with the taste, but gives a consistency of colour between batches.

Macallan appears to have gone out of fashion somewhat. Still good whisky, as is Glenfiddich.
 
2 bottles of pinot grigio
2 bottles of corona
4 double vodka soda
1 20oz pint of Helles
From 1930-330.
 
Fwiffo said:
Macallan changed their age statements to lyrical grades here. After a few years of higher prices and I presume declining sales, I remember seeing a sales rep come out to say they will put age statements on again.
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Suntory has largely stopped selling a few different types of aged whisky, but I think that was because demand skyrocketed and they ran out of supply. That's the problem when you're making something that you won't sell for another 12 or 18 years - you can't simply ramp up the supply!

Fwiffo said:
A lot of single malts use colour agents similar to Coca Cola to give a consistent colour.
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Reminds me of when I was travelling through the backblocks of Indonesia and my host in a small town asked me to get some alcohol that we could drink with the dog that his wife was preparing for dinner.

After roaming around town I managed to track down a bottle of whisky in a small store.

Turning the bottle over, the label said:

Ingredients: Alcohol, whisky flavour
 
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