Booze Reviews: Tomasello Winery’s Raspberry Wine
It's not often that I get to rave about a product. But this is one of my favorite dessert wines and, as we all head into the weekend and try to forget about Monday, I thought I'd share it with you and do a little raving.
This is the one fruit wine that I've been able to find in smaller stores that is made with 100% of the fruit on the bottle and won't break your wallet into a thousand pieces. Most other "fruity' wines are cheap and made with a mixture of some kind of grapes and a bit of fruit and oftentimes "natural" flavors, which to me just sounds like cheating. If you're going to make a fruit wine USE THE FRUIT! Tomasello uses only the fruit on the bottle to make their wines and it SHOWS.
Here's why this wine is so great: it actually tastes like raspberries. Stay with me now; I'm not high. This wine tastes like something you might make in your basement if you had a master wine-maker for a best friend. If you went to the store and bought a gazillion raspberries (spell check does not catch "gazillion"...good to know) and then under the watchful eye of your wine-ninja friend you fermented some kick-ass wine from only the freshest raspberries (not the crappy ones that come in every box either... THE GOOD ONES) this is what you'd have.
The other thing I like that Tomasello does is sell slightly smaller bottles (500ml). This means you can get them cheap (About $10-$12 a bottle where I buy it) and try new flavors without worrying that you're going to blow a bunch of cash on a crappy wine. All in all I think they've got 6 flavors now, all made with 100% of whatever fruit is on the bottle, including pomegranate, blueberry, and cherry. Take a chance on this one, you won't be disappointed.
Grade: **** (Highly Recommended) Price: $10-12
Booze Reviews: Leinenkugel’s Berry Weiss
I know what you're thinking. "Berry-beer? Just how 'berry' are we talking here?" Very berry, my friend. Very berry indeed. Don't be scared...it'll be ok.
Leinenkugel's makes one of my favorite wheat beers (Sunset Wheat) which we reviewed here not to long ago on the site. I've seen a lot of mixed reviews about Leinenkugel's Sunset Wheat because, when you get right down to it, it tastes an awful lot like Fruit Loops. I'll be honest with you: I'm not really in to dark beers (I know...I need to broaden my beer-horizons) so the fruit loopy thing is right up my alley. Well, if you didn't like that one you won't like this because it takes the fruitiness up another notch.
The Fruitiness goes to eleven...
Ok, maybe it doesn't literally go to 11. But if you don't like sweeter, lighter, wheat beers then you're going to hate this stuff with a passion. Your beer belly might even reject you entirely and waddle its fat self out the door in disgust. But if you're open minded...and maybe a little fruity yourself. his is actually a decent, albeit very sweet, expression of wheat beer.
When I said 'lighter' before I meant color because this is certainly not a sugar-free beer nor is it easy on the calories at 207 per serving. I suppose you could classify this as "dessert beer" if you really wanted to because its really more of a treat than it is something you might sit down with at a meal. The blurb on Leinenkugel's website says that it's brewed with Logan, Elder and Blackberry flavors but the label says it's made with real blackberry juice. The truth is you're going to taste that blackberry more than anything.
It's not quite soda-pop but if you're used to drinking Guinness you just might mistake it for one. On the other hand if you're new to the beer-game or trying to introduce someone there are worse places to start.
Rating: *** (Recommended) Price: $7.50
HEY YOU! I really would like to learn to appreciate the darker varieties of beer; so leave me a comment on where I should start...just be gentle.
Booze Reviews: Leinenkugel’s Sunset Wheat
You know wheat beer is hot when Budweiser decides to get in on it. But it's not who does it first, it's who does it best and the best wheat beer I've so far is Leinenkugel's Sunset Wheat. You might have noticed that the boozebloggers just aren't that into the dark beers. But we're still trying to develop a taste for it, so bare with us. I really just don't like the idea of coffee in my beer. Now coffee with alcohol, that I can get behind. But for me I'm really just more comfortable with something I don't have to try to like. That's Leinenkugel's in a nut-shell.
So what does it taste like. I can state confidently that this beer bares an uncanny resemblance...to fruitloops. That's right. The sugary childhood cereal we all loved now comes in beer form! It's actually not that sweet, just sweet enough really. What I can't get over though is the drinkability. It's smooth and goes down easy but its not like your average corporate light-beer without any kind of distinctive flavor.
You see, when you're marketing a beer all across the country you have to try to formulate it so that it makes everyone happy. But the thing is, regardless of what you were told in school, not everyone's opinion matters. We all know some very, very stupid people who should not have a say in how beer tastes. This is the downfall of the big three brands: Budweiser, Coors, and Miller. They have to make everyone happy so they have to make their beer taste like nothing. As a consequence the most distinctive flavor you're going to get out of a Bud-light is a just a hint of "bar-o-soap." That's fine if your aim in drinking beer is to get drunk at a frat party. Personally though I like to enjoy my beer.
When out-n-about I'm usually a hard-liquor guy. I scan the bar for the whisk(e)y's I haven't tried yet and order the oldest one they've got. As a result I'm more focused on my $10-a-shot booze, plus I tend to get buzzed faster than my friends. I just don't have a great fondness for beer. But with Leinenkugel's Sunset Wheat I feel like I've got something worth ordering. So support the little guys - even if it costs a little more. Otherwise all we'll have left to drink is Bud-Lite-Soap-Weiser.
A - $8 - six pack
Booze Reviews: Tequila Rose
I went through 8 bottles and couldn't find a single straight label. Maybe that's where all the Tequila went.
Tequila Rose is a bottle of booze that I've passed on the shelf in my local liquor store at least 100 times. It's not too fancy but it always catches my eye. It's billed as a Strawberry Cream Liqueur with just a splash of tequila. By splash they must mean single drop because I can't taste the tequila at all. But in a drink like this, maybe that's a good thing.
Let's face it. Dudes (other than guys like me who are totally manly and secure in their sexuality and run booze-blogs that necessitate buying fruity shit) are not going in to their local "booze barn" to buy Tequila Rose - at least not on purpose. That leaves two customers: bartenders and chicks. And when you get right down to it, even bartenders are only buying this for one reason: to make girly drinks for chicks. This relatively small target market may be why Tequila Rose is currently offering a rebate on the bottle that gives you a more than 50% payback with a single purchase. But even though their customer base is probably small, I bet the ladies love this shit. Why wouldn't they?
It's got everything the ladies love: strawberries, cream, and booze you can't taste! At 15% abv. This isn't going to get anyone drunk very fast. Again, exactly what the ladies want - the ability to get a guy to buy them 10 or 15 drinks in a night and still have the sobriety to say, "Sorry, just you and righty tonight, chump".
The problem is that tequila rose is also virtually tasteless. Yes, the strawberry flavor is present but it's completely overpowered by the unholy-zombie-devil-cream-concoction in the bottle. Tequila rose has approximately 69 calories (you're damn right they did that on purpose) and no fat at all. Then what the fuck is in this bottle that can be called "cream"? (SERIOUSLY! What the fuck am I drinking?) It tastes an awful lot like Bailey's; but we both know Bailey's is contributing heavily to my fat-ass so what kind of deal with Beelzebub did you make, Tequila Rose?
So buy this stuff for your girlfriend if you like (even though it's useless in accomplishing the primary purpose of alcoholic beverages). Tell her it's fat-free and she'll probably down the whole bottle in one sitting. Then maybe you might be able to justify the 17.99 you and I both wasted.
Rated: D, for "don't waste your money". ($18)
Booze Reviews: Patron 100% Agave Silver Tequila
Slightly cheaper than psychotherapy.
If you've never tried it, Patron is that one tequila that you see absolutely everywhere (even at your local Wal-mart) but still costs you an arm and a leg ($40+ usually). Since it's so prevalent, and pricey, you'd think Patron would be -- what are the kids saying these days--the shit?
You can't really compare a Tequila like Patron to something like, say, José Cuervo. They're simply not made of the same stuff. The best Tequila is distilled from 100% Blue Agave which looks something like this:
Tequila exists because someone once looked at that spiny nightmare and said: "I'd like to have that in my mouth."
The José Cuervo tequila that begins almost every "I WAS SO DRUNK" story is actually a watered-down version of real tequila, it's distilled from something like 50-60% agave which is the main flavor component in any tequila. Patron on the other hand is made from 100% agave which explains why the agave flavor is a lot stronger and it costs a lot more.
It also tastes a lot better than José Cuervo; that is if you're not shooting it and then licking random co-eds. (Yeah, I get it, you get to lick a random stranger and everyone goes "wooo-hooo" and for a while the crowd loves you and you don't hear the constant voice of your father saying, "Daddy loves his booze...more than you.") But the thrill never really lasts does it? Also, Patron is not for your wife's margaritas-laced-with-estrogen parties. Leave her with the cheap silver stuff; she'll never know the difference.
This is all because Patron is what you call a super-premium liquor. That's right Americans have so much money now that regular liquor is no longer good enough. We need bullshit monikers like "super-premium" to get our egos through the day. Here's the question: what does all that super-premium cash get you, really? Well in the case of Patron it buys you a hand-blown glass bottle as well as a fancy cardboard box that caries a life-size picture of the type of Patron you're buying - just in case you or anyone else forgot. And let's not forget the biggest reason to buy Patron - and where I suspect the bulk of the super-premium price goes - THE CORK! Have you ever seen a bigger or more magnificent cork on a bottle of booze?
"But what does it taste like?"
Did you miss the part about the cork? Why are you still here? Why aren't you out buying Patron RIGHT NOW?
Maybe it's because for all the hype surrounding this Tequila it's really only one of many 100% agave tequilas on the market and, on average, costs twice as much. Now, I'll admit this, I am a consumer whore. I like to buy pretty things just because. But I'm also strongly against blowing my cash on the package my booze comes in. Patron tastes like a better than average Tequila. If you've been drinking nothing but José Cuervo since college then of course this is going to seem like a revelation. On the other hand if you've tried other 100% agave varieties I don't think this one is going to move to the top of your list.
B+ $40
P.S. if you're looking for some other 100% agave tequilas to try I'd recommend starting with either José Cuervo Tradicional or Suaza Hornitos, both are good tequilas at an entry-level price.
Booze Reviews: Curacao of Curacao
Ok, what's so damn special about Curacao? Nothing. Usually. Almost all Curacao you're going to find on the market is emulating an old bitter orange liqueur that was originally made on the island of Curacao which is part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Here's how it came to be:
A long, long time ago on a continent far, far away, the Spaniards landed on the the Island of Curacao with some orange trees and thought, "This looks like a good place to grow some fuckin' oranges". Well, they were wrong. DEAD WRONG. Well, ok, maybe nobody died but the orange trees they tried to plant didn't produce the kind of citrus fruit we all know and love to use for making screwdrivers. What it did produce is some greenish oranges that were really fuckin' sour. Of course, nobody wanted to eat these oranges so the Spainiards, those outrageous "moustachioed gentlemen", gave up on their Creamsicle dreams. Luckily, the industrious people of Curacao saw the potential of those ugly little orange trees and over time learned how to make booze out of them!
Those crazy Spaniards and their enviable moustaches.
What they created was a sweet, yet slightly bitter, orange liqueur that had a very distinct flavor and would eventually find a place in many classic cocktails. Over time corporations realized that most people wouldn't be able to tell the difference if they just used some random orange and bitter-ish flavors, dyed their liquor blue, and called it "curacao." As a result, every single bottle you find today that bears the name "curacao" bears no resemblance to the original, except for one. Curacao of Curacao is the only curacao on the market today that is actually made from the same oranges those crazy Spaniards planted so long ago. It even comes in that weird blue color, if that's what you're into.
The taste is orange, yes, but it's a different kind of orange than you've ever tasted before. Growing oranges on the Island of Curacao was a dismal failure but what it left was a very unique little orange that none other artificially flavored curacao can match. This is one of my favorite bottles of liqueur because it is truly unique and not many people have even heard of it. I can't really describe it accurately words but when you taste it, you'll know.
Here's the thing: most people have been drinking counterfeit curacao for so long that when you replace the fake curacao in a drink with Curacao of Curacao it's naturally going to taste a little different. If you want to know what was so special about those classic cocktails that used curacao, you need to use this. I'm extolling these virtues because I do not want this liqueur to die. If it goes then the world loses its ties to the original flavors and we will never get them back. Dramatic? Yes. But, you know what else is extinct? The Stegosaurus. Seriously! Don't you wish you could ride a Stegosaurus? Me too! AND IF THOSE GODDAMN SPANIARDS HADN'T KILLED THEM ALL THE WORLD WOULD BE A BETTER PLACE.
Curacao of Curacao A+ $25 Expensive, but worth it to save an endangered species of booze.
Booze Reviews: Hornsby’s Hard Cider
Sorry, couldn't find a picture of the one we reviewed. Look for the Hard Cider with the green label.
My wife hates beer. But to her credit she's trying to develop a taste for it. To that end, yesterday we picked up some Hornsby's Hard Cider. That's kinda like beer, right?
Here's a recap of her first taste:
"Mmm, apples... eww, beer."
At least she's trying.
Personally I think Hornsby's is a solid cider. Normally I don't drink with my meal, but it's got a crisp, natural, apple taste to it that I think could work well with a lot of things. The flavor isn't as overpowering as a lot of beer and at 5.5% it's still got a decent alcoholic kick to it.
Not everybody likes Hornsby's. According to Imbibable you should "serve this to your friends and watch their faces contort in horror." If your friends are as snobby as that reviewer then, yeah, maybe. But based on my own tasting I can't find too much wrong with this brew. It's not necessarily outstanding but as an everyday drink I'd say it's fairly pleasant. Actually, I've finished half of the six pack in the last 24hrs. Which may be more sign of my latent alcoholism than the merits of this beverage but it can't be that bad if I want to keep drinking it, right? RIGHT?!
If, like my wife, you're just learning to appreciate booze then I'd say this is a decent place to start and even if you like the harder stuff this is better than ordering Sprite on a night when you'd like to drive yourself home for once. I'm sure there might be some better hard ciders out there but Hornsby's certainly isn't the worst. If you happen to be a hard cider aficionado please leave us some geeky comments about how wrong we are and how much better your favorite cider is.
B+/ 7.50 6-pack - Definitely drinkable.
Booze Reviews: Young’s Double Chocolate Stout
Chocolate Beer: it sounds like a great idea, doesn't it? Well, maybe it doesn't, but I'm a huge dark chocolate fan, so to me it sounded awesome. I've seen this bottle of booze in a lot of stores but I've never picked it up until now. Since last weekend Adam and I had a marathon writing session where we reviewed 50% of what's in my booze closet I figured now was just about the best time to finally give Young's Double Chocolate Stout a go.
Our initial impressions were opposite. Adam immediately thought it tasted like dirt, literally. I, on the other hand, tried hard to take in whatever chocolate flavor I could find in the beer. It's definitely there, but this is not ChocoVine; it isn't meant to be like a dessert wine. Dark beer is one of the only beverages that can stand up to the powerful taste of a really dark chocolate and I think some kind of fusion was what Young's was going for with this stout.
Adam is a much bigger beer fan than I am but I'm a much bigger dark chocolate fan than he is, so I think our opposite impressions are understandable. Even on separate tastings I couldn't help but feel like it was drinking a dark beer someone spiked with cocoa powder. That dry, slightly bitter, powdery kind of mouth feel is present in a most unpleasant way. I even tried pairing this with a nice bar of Ghirardelli dark chocolate and it actually make my chocolate bar less enjoyable.
What Young's Double Chocolate Stout does is two different good things poorly. It's taken something that some people already enjoy: dark chocolate paired separately with a dark beer, and they tried to fuse it into a more convenient package. I'm not sure who this beer is being marketed to. Possibly curious drinkers like me, but even if this beer brings in that demographic I can't believe too many people are becoming regular drinkers.
C+/ $3.50 - Give it a shot if you're curious, but not recommended
Booze Reviews: Tsingtao Beer
Tsingtao has been around. It's the best selling beer in China and has been brewed there for something like 107 years. Well...I think it needs more work. I wouldn't go so far as to describe it as skunky ass-water but some have. I don't taste the ass per se but that may be my under-developed palate or because this beer is so fucking bitter that nothing else is able to sneak past. To be fair I've heard this beer tastes better on tap.....if you're in China.
Maybe it used to be better. According to wikipedia, after the People's Republic of China was installed, the Tsingtao brewery was no longer able to use imported ingredients or the the kick-ass water from the Laoshin mountains. The new government "encouraged" the peasants to take over the task of gathering those raw materials. Probably by putting a gun in their mouths and saying "Chairman Mao wants his beer and it's the people's work, bitch." This may be why Tsingtao tastes faintly of the tears of small children.
Please observe this commercial about how Tsingtao can get you hot American babes. That is, if you happen to be a murderous dictator......named Mao Tse Tung... and you're packing... but not in the good (penis) way.
So, yeah, if you want to support communism then, by all means, buy Tsingtao.
Overall Score: D+
-ryan was later attacked by what appeared to be a ninja but would like you all to know that he'd still rather be dead than red.
Booze Reviews: Captain Morgan Tattoo
The Captain. He hung on your dorm room wall for four solid years promoting his tasty low-cost rum to the college masses. It's a good rum. A wholesome rum. The kind of rum you can take home to your alcoholic mother. But, you see, one day The Captain saw you had another booze on your wall; a younger booze, a prettier booze with a tight ass that you gave an affectionate nickname (jaeger-baby) to and, well, The Captain got jealous...
When I first started drinking I looked upon this bottle longingly. It was the mystery of what might be contained within that drew me in. The old Captain that I loved had a new style and I couldn't wait to try it. Little did I know I already had tried it in a similarly black bottle except this one had a deer on it.
Alright , enough beating around the bush; I'm just going to say it. Captain Morgan totally ripped off Jaegermeister A- in a bad way. Jaeger isn't exactly the kind of high class liquor you'd drink all by itself but, damn, could The Captain have gone any more wrong with this one? It's like they took all of the herbal qualities out of Jaeger, added straight un-spiced white rum to it and called it "Tattoo." I imagine the pitch for Captian Morgan Tattoo went something like this:
Shmee - "Mr. President, I have some bad news, the kids aren't drinking as much Captain Morgan as they used to.
The Cap - "Shiver me fuckin' timbers, my profits be dwindlin! What be the problem laddy?"
Shmee - "Tis a new whore at bay by the name of Jaeger; they say she does things with her one good arm that would make a man forget that thing on her neck"
The Cap - "Aye, there be only one thing to do. Steal me some Jaeger, add some of me rum to it and call it "Tattoo." That's what all the kiddies be drinkin' these days, aye?"
Shmee - Arrrrr Captain.
The Cap - Arrrrr
Shmee - Arrrrr
Yep, I bet that's exactly how it went, because I'll be damned if Tattoo isn't a blatant rip-off of Jaegermeister and a bad one, too. I don't really mind rip-offs. If you can take something I like and make it better and sell it cheaper then I will buy it. I'm all for naked cut-throat capitalism. But if you're gonna rip off an established brand at least do it well. This is further proof that Captain Morgan has no real friends. Real friends don't let their friends release blatant rip-offs unless they're at least as good as the original.
F+/ $18 / Don't buy this unless you're a consumer-whore like me who just can't resist.