Jacob Grier

This week’s Mixology Monday was supposed to happen last week, the day after dozens of cocktail bloggers descended on New Orleans for a long weekend of drinking and socializing at Tales of the Cocktail. The idea was that we’d all write about one of favorite drinks from the weekend, or about a cocktail inspired by New Orleans. A great plan, except that by Monday the lot of us were traveling, recovering, or shaking in fear at the smell of alcohol. So our fearless leader and MxMo founder Paul Clarke pushed things back to today, giving us all a week to catch up.

My cocktail for the month is Stephen Beaumont’s Green Devil, from his seminar on “How to View Beer as an Ingredient Rather than as the Drink Unto Itself.” Since I love beer possibly even more than cocktails (as do most other Americans), this was one of my favorite events of the weekend. The Green Devil’s also an apt drink for this MxMo. It uses absinthe, a classic New Orleans cocktail ingredient. The star of the show is the Belgian ale Duvel, which would have been perfect for our original MxMo date of July 21, Belgian independence day. And most importantly, Duvel threw in a free glass, and I’m a sucker for glassware giveaways.

Anyway, time is short as I have a ton of packing to do, so let’s go straight to the ingredients:

rinse of absinthe
1 oz gin (Beaumont recommends Martin Miller’s)
1 bottle Duvel

Rinse your glass with the absinthe and add the gin. Pour in the Duvel, aiming for a big, foamy head. The absinthe adds a nice anise aroma, just don’t add too much. It’s big, it’s tasty, it’s good — perfect for when an 8.5% abv ale just isn’t strong enough on its own.

[Gallup link via Sullivan]

Now that I’m off employer-provided health insurance I’ve had to apply for individual coverage. The application understandably asks if I consume alcohol. Weirdly, it also asks what kind of alcohol: beer, wine, or liquor. I don’t know how to answer that. How many people who drink limit themselves to just one category? Oddly enough, as I was completing the application I was experimenting with a cocktail made with spirits and beer; even at that very moment I couldn’t answer the question accurately.

A more interesting question is why they were asking that. The health benefits of moderate wine consumption are well known, but they appear to accrue equally from consuming beer and liquor, and the application specifically notes the equivalence among 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine, and 1 ounce of liquor. I suspect that the question might be a kind of profiling, reflecting an assumption that people who admit to predominately drinking liquor are more likely to have problems with excessive drinking. Statistically, this might be true, but it doesn’t apply in my case. So I answered beer on the form, given that I enjoy it about as often as I do harder spirits.

Is there some other reason for the question of which I’m unaware?

As a follow-up to George Will’s column on selection for genetic adaptation to alcohol, here’s a report on a new study:

As many as one in four Britons have a much-reduced risk of developing alcohol-related cancer thanks to their genetic make-up, scientists have discovered. Researchers have identified two genes that quickly flush alcohol out of the system, thus reducing its carcinogenic effect. People carrying one or both of the genes may have only half the chance of developing mouth, throat and oesophageal cancers that are strongly associated with drinking.

Also:

Health experts welcomed the findings, but warned that they should not be interpreted as a green light to drink heavily. ‘This shouldn’t have any direct effect on people’s drinking behaviour. Those people with one or both of these rare gene variants are lucky in that they are at lesser risk of developing these cancers. Having up to half the risk is significant,’ said Wiseman. ‘But they still face some risk. So the advice to them wouldn’t be, “Go away and drink”. It would be, “For cancer prevention, avoid alcohol entirely if you can and, if you do drink, limit it to one drink a day for a woman and two drinks a day for a man”.’

Given that moderate alcohol consumption is also linked to reduced risk of heart disease (and high levels of fun), avoiding alcohol entirely doesn’t sound like good advice.

The InBev buyout of Budweiser is going through. Paul Krugman catches my favorite observation in a story from the WSJ:

“I’ll tell you one thing,” said the 21-year-old concrete worker during his lunch break at The Brick of St. Louis bar, in the shadow of this city’s storied Anheuser-Busch Cos. brewery, “if Budweiser is made by a different country, I don’t drink Budweiser anymore. I’ll go back to Wild Turkey.” (Wild Turkey, a Kentucky bourbon, is owned by French drinks giant Pernod Ricard SA.)

Dan Mitchell looks sees in the buyout a lesson for the US tax code:

Rather than engage in demagoguery against foreign investment, maybe Senator Obama and his colleagues should fix the tax code so that U.S. companies are not disadvantaged in global markets. America’s high corporate tax rate, combined with a pernicious policy of taxing worldwide income of American-based firms, makes it very difficult for those companies to compete.

Belgium, by contrast, has a lower corporate tax rate. More important, it has a territorial tax system — the common-sense notion of taxing only income earned inside national borders. As such, it makes sense — from the perspective of all shareholders — for Anheuser-Busch to be taken over by InBev rather than the other way around. Indeed, that is why American companies almost always become the subsidiary rather than the parent when there is a cross-border merger.

Fans of real Belgian beer should plan to knock a few back this Monday, July 21, Belgium’s Independence Day. Brasserie Beck in DC is celebrating with half-price drafts all day on 18 different beers. The list is online at the restaurant’s stupid, unlinkable Flash site.

By the time I got into cocktails the sloe gin fizz was long out of fashion, at least in my part of the country. And with good reason: the long-ignored bottles you see on the bottom shelf at the liquor store are reportedly some sickly sweet stuff.

That’s finally changing. A few years ago Plymouth gin (my home bar standard) dusted off its 1883 recipe. It’s made by infusing sugar and fresh sloe berries (the sour fruit of the blackthorne tree) into still-strength gin. After a few months the liquor is sweet, sour, fruity, and complex, with a hint of nuttiness from the pits. At its final 52 proof strength it’s enjoyable on its own, but most famously combined with lemon, soda, and simple syrup in a sloe gin fizz.

This year Plymouth finally exported its sloe gin to the US. It’s available in limited quantities and runs a little over $40 a bottle in DC (Central Liquors and Sherry’s are both carrying it). Anticipating its arrival, Washington Post spirits columnist Jason Wilson challenged area bartenders to reinterpret sloe gin standards with the new, good stuff. Though I’m no longer working at a bar where I can feature it, I’m happy with this variation on the sloe gin fizz. The Hothouse Fizz cuts the sweetness and adds a little cucumber to the mix for a refreshing, summery treat:

1.5 oz. Plymouth gin
1.5 oz. Plymouth sloe gin
.5 oz. lemon juice
.25 oz. simple syrup
2 wheels cucumber
soda water

Muddle the cucumber with the simple syrup, then shake over ice with the gins and lemon juice. Strain over ice, and a bit of soda, and float a cucumber garnish to complete the drink. The cucumber adds a really nice vegetal element to the drink; just don’t use too much or it will overpower the other flavors. It’s tempting to use Hendricks here, but sticking with Plymouth and using a hothouse cucumber keeps the British theme going.

In his column today, George Will takes issue with the claim that beer is a non-essential good. What didn’t kill us made us stronger:

[Alcohol], although it is a poison, and an addictive one, became, especially in beer, a driver of a species-strengthening selection process.

[Steven] Johnson notes that historians interested in genetics believe that the roughly simultaneous emergence of urban living and the manufacturing of alcohol set the stage for a survival-of-the-fittest sorting-out among the people who abandoned the hunter-gatherer lifestyle and, literally and figuratively speaking, went to town.

To avoid dangerous water, people had to drink large quantities of, say, beer. But to digest that beer, individuals needed a genetic advantage that not everyone had — what Johnson describes as the body’s ability to respond to the intake of alcohol by increasing the production of particular enzymes called alcohol dehydrogenases. This ability is controlled by certain genes on chromosome four in human DNA, genes not evenly distributed to everyone. Those who lacked this trait could not, as the saying goes, “hold their liquor.” So, many died early and childless, either of alcohol’s toxicity or from waterborne diseases.

The gene pools of human settlements became progressively dominated by the survivors — by those genetically disposed to, well, drink beer. “Most of the world’s population today,” Johnson writes, “is made up of descendants of those early beer drinkers, and we have largely inherited their genetic tolerance for alcohol.”

Incidentally, Will is speaking at Cato about his new book on July 24.

[Via Mike.]

I already knew Portland boasts the most breweries per capita in the United States, but this is even more appealing:

The small craft distillery scene has hit Portland, reminiscent of the microbrewery boom two decades ago. Young microbrewers and winemakers are now distilling whiskey, brandy, grappa and even absinthe. And taking a page from Kentucky’s iconic whiskey distillers, they are beginning to host tours and tastings. With 17 microdistilleries in Oregon, and eight more startups expected across the state by year’s end, spirits aficionados haven’t seen anything like this in recent memory.

Sure, boutique distilleries also dot the landscapes in Michigan and Northern California, but only in Oregon do most artisan distilleries concentrate around a city. Collectively, the distillers help shape the bar and culinary scene in Portland. The Rose City is now seeing a renaissance of classic cocktails, and some high-end restaurants are trying experimental pairings of food with spirits.

“The distillery scene here is where the wine industry in California was in the 1960s,” said Steve McCarthy, owner of Clear Creek Distillery, one of the nation’s first microdistilleries. “We are rewriting all the rules. The artisan distilleries are making up a whole new industry.”

Congrats also to Lance Mayhew, whom the article calls one of the “city’s best bartenders.”

One of the next steps I’d like to take in my drinks education is getting to know more about the production process for spirits, beer, and coffee. By that measure, Portland is hard to beat.

[Via Slashfood.]

Previously:
One year

Because my friend Amy was there at the time, and her mom likes ginger drinks, and that’s how this one came to be…

This month’s Mixology Monday theme is bourbon, hosted by my fellow Arlingtonians at Scofflaw’s Den. Bourbon’s one of my favorite spirits, and a conversation about drinks made with ginger ale inspired my friend and I to try out the Bufala Negra from the Oakroom in Louisville, KY, as printed in the Food and Wine 2008 Cocktails 2008 guide. It’s a drink that combines balsamic vinegar and basil — a duo I enjoyed in my previous MxMo — with bourbon and ginger ale. I’m sure it’s a great drink at the Oakroom, but it was missing a little something when I made it at home. Maybe it was the ginger ale I used (Reed’s) or the substitution of balsamic syrup for separate vinegar and simple syrup (see the previous entry), but it needed a little bit more complexity.

That’s where the allspice dram comes in. Originally known as “pimento dram,” the obscure liqueur fell out of favor and was largely forgotten except among true drink enthusiasts, some of whom turned to making homemade versions from rum, allspice, and sugar. Luckily, it’s back, and with a name that doesn’t bring to mind those weird red things in the center of cocktail olives: St. Elizabeth’s Allspice Dram. (DC area readers can find it at Central Liquors.)

Allspice, so named because the berries of the pimento bush reminded the English or clove, cinnamon, nutmeg, and other spices all at once, is intensely aromatic, and can add wonderful complexity to cocktails. Often used in tiki drinks, it also plays well with bourbon, as in the classic Lion’s Tail. A little dash of it was just what my drink needed, and we’re pretty sure Amy’s mom would like it too. Here’s a recipe that worked for me, but vary it to fit your particular ingredients:

3 basil leaves, plus 1 for garnish
1/3 oz balsamic syrup
2 oz bourbon (I used Bulleit)
1/4 oz allspice dram
ginger ale (I used Reed’s)

Muddle the basil leaves with the syrup, add the bourbon and allspice dram, shake, and strain over ice. Top with a short pour of ginger ale. Add the garnish and enjoy.

Update 6/19/08: The month’s full recap is posted here.

“If it is useful and necessary, free yourself from imagining that you need to enhance it by adding what is not an integral part of its usefulness or necessity.” The quote is one of the guiding principles of the Shaker philosophy of design. I don’t think religious Shakers approve of alcohol consumption, but it’s a good principle for designing cocktail shakers too. Simple is superior.

Unfortunately, as I learned last week, simple doesn’t always sell. It was my younger sister’s 21st birthday and, being a good bartender brother, I decided to set her up with all the equipment she’ll need to mix up good drinks at home. I thought this would be easy, and most of it was, but finding a cocktail shaker was surprisingly difficult. I went to 6-7 stores looking for a basic shaker and pint glass (a Boston shaker), but only Williams-Sonoma had one, and it was fifty bucks. It was pretty, but it’s just a stainless steel cylinder. If your shaker costs more than your bourbon, you’re either using the wrong shaker or the wrong bourbon.

The shaker every other store had is like the one pictured above. It’s got a lid with strainer, a smaller cap, recipes etched into the side, and an outside cylinder that rotates around the outside to display the ingredients in each drink. This is the kind of thing that might seem like a good idea in concept, but in practice the design is just terrible. How dost it suck? Let me count the ways.

First, the lid and the cap. There’s a reason most bartenders don’t use these. They’re extra parts, and if the steel has contracted from the cold and your hands are wet, they can be hard to take separate. All you need is a the cylinder and a pint glass. Build the drink in the glass, shake it up, snap off the glass and strain. Easy.

That’s fine for a pro, but maybe you want a shaker with a lid, and maybe you like the idea of having recipes on the side of it. Fine. You’ll change your mind when you actually try these drinks. With room for just 14 of them, the designers should have covered the essentials. Instead they chose drinks like the Dreamsicle and the Bahama Mama. In all my time working as a bartender, no one has asked for a Bahama Mama. Ever. Unless your home is a tiki bar in the tropics, odds are your guests won’t order one either.

Selection aside, you’d hope that they at least got the recipes right. But anyone who tries these recipes is going to get not only a poorly balanced cocktail, but also a weak one — like the Cosmopolitan that calls for just 1 oz of vodka and an entire ounce of cranberry juice. The average person buying this product probably cares more about getting getting buzzed than becoming a stellar bartender, but with just 1 oz of vodka they’re not even going to accomplish that. They will, however, get plenty of vitamin C.

Finally, there’s the way the recipes are laid out. Each ingredient is set one column apart and one row down from previous one, so you need to dial a drink in and look through the gaps in the outer cylinder to see what goes into it. This isn’t just inconvenient, it’s risky. Wet fingers plus a diagonal row of holes cut into steel is a blood-stained cocktail waiting to happen. And it’s so stupidly unnecessary. If they just arranged the ingredients in vertical rows, the shaker wouldn’t even need the outside cylinder because you could just read down the column to see what goes in each recipe. The whole two-cylinder dial-a-recipe thing is a cave-in to some stupid designer who couldn’t tell a Manhattan from a Martini. There is no functional reason for this at all.

And what did I do? I bought it. Didn’t have a choice. Luckily the outer cylinder snaps off and can be discarded, which I advised my sister to do. I also got her a book of good recipes so she won’t be tempted to try the mixological disasters listed on the side. She’s on her way to successful home bartending, no thanks to Target and other various housewares stores.

Whatever happened to that French joie de vivre? The Guardian Reuters reports:

France is considering a ban on happy hours in bars and on the sale of bottles of vodka and other strong liquor in nightclubs as part of efforts to curb binge drinking among young people, an official said on Monday.

Not that things are free and easy here in Virginia. Among other restrictions, establishments here can’t extend happy hour beyond 9 pm, advertise their specials, or sell mixed drinks in pitchers. I believe a few bars get around the time restriction by offering one low-priced beer only on certain nights; thus its price is never discounted, it’s just always low when it happens to be available. I wonder if French legislation would allow a similar loophole.

On its last day in session, the Alabama Senate was bogged down in filibusters. That’s good news for smokers, who will retain their freedom to inhale in private businesses. Not so good for gourmet beer drinkers, who will have to keep on waiting for the higher alcohol brews they’re currently denied.

Today’s Mixology Monday is all about rum, a spirit of which I know virtually nothing. Sure, I use it in an occasional Mojito, Cuba Libre, or Dark and Stormy, but I haven’t experimented with many different bottlings or with more adventurous flavor combinations. For this MxMo, then, I didn’t strive for anything original.

Instead I turned to The Art of the Bar, the fantastically inventive cocktail book from Absinthe Brasserie and Bar’s Jeff Hollinger and Rob Schwartz, and source of one of my favorite recipes of late: the Sangre de Fresca.

The Sangre de Fresca features cachaca. Some might say this doesn’t count as a rum, but it is distilled from sugar cane and rum has always played fast and loose with its definitions. I’m mixing with Leblon, which actually calls itself a Brazilian rum and is barrel aged, so I’m going to go with it. For the sticklers in the audience, I’ll shake one up with rum, too. It’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make; I drink to make you happy. Here’s the recipe:

2 hulled strawberries
4-5 basil leaves
.5 oz balsamic syrup*
1.5 oz cachaca
.25 oz Cointreau
.25 oz lime juice
soda water

Muddle the berries, syrup, and leaves. Add the spirits and lime juice and shake with ice, then strain over rocks and top with soda. This makes a nicely refreshing drink. The ripe, fruity smell of the cachaca pairs really well with the balsamic syrup, and of course strawberries and balsamic vinegar is a winning combination.

To tie this more perfectly to the rum theme, I’ve also tried this a few times with Rhum Barbancourt, a Haitian rum aged for four years, in place of the cachaca. This makes for a smoother drink, but the more powerful cachaca stands up better to the other strong flavors at play; the Brazilian spirit’s the way to go here.

To follow the rest of this month’s MxMo’s entrants, check in with Trader Tiki for the recap. And for an informative article on rum, see Paul Clarke’s recent piece in The San Francisco Chronicle.

*For the syrup, dissolve 1.5 cups of sugar into half a cup of water in a saucepan over medium heat. Stir until the water dissolves and the sugar caramelizes to an amber color. In a separate pan, simmer 1.5 cups of balsamic vinegar. Then take both off the heat and carefully add the vinegar to the caramelized sugar. Be careful, it will spatter messily. Heat the mix a few minutes longer until it thickens, cool it an ice bath (it retains heat very well), bottle, and store in the refrigerator. It’s a nice thing to have around and lasts a long time.

Update 5/13/08: Trader Tiki’s got your wrap-up right here.

We’ve got our problems with too much ethanol, and so did nineteenth century cafe goers. But while our excess ethanol wastes money and starves the poor, theirs just made absinthe drinkers a little too drunk:

An analysis of century-old bottles of absinthe - the kind once quaffed by the likes of van Gogh and Picasso to enhance their creativity - may end the controversy over what ingredient caused the green liqueur’s supposed mind-altering effects.

The culprit seems plain and simple: The century-old absinthe contained about 70 percent alcohol, giving it a 140-proof kick…

The modern scientific consensus is that absinthe’s reputation could simply be traced back to alcoholism, or perhaps toxic compounds that leaked in during faulty distillation. Still, others have pointed at a chemical named thujone in wormwood, one of the herbs used to prepare absinthe and the one that gives the drink its green color. Thujone was blamed for “absinthe madness” and “absinthism,” a collection of symptoms including hallucinations, facial tics, numbness and dementia.

Prior studies suggested that absinthe had only trace levels of thujone. But critics claimed that absinthe made before it got banned in France in 1915 had much higher levels of thujone than modern absinthe produced since 1988, when the European Union lifted the ban on making absinthe.

“Today it seems a substantial minority of consumers want these myths to be true, even if there is no empirical evidence that they are,” said researcher Dirk Lachenmeier, a chemist with the Chemical and Veterinary Investigation Laboratory of Karlsruhe in Germany.

Lachenmeier and his colleagues analyzed 13 samples of absinthe from old, sealed bottles in France, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and the United States dated back to the early 1900s before the ban. After uncorking the bottles, they found relatively small concentrations of thujone in that absinthe, about the same as those in modern varieties.

Perhaps this will put to rest the debate about the authenticity of the new wave of absinthes, and if we’re really lucky persuade the US government to become less uptight about approving them.

Previously:
Night with the Green Fairy
Sazerac variations

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports on how Washington state officials are frustrated by the fact that, despite efforts to ban the beverages favored by the brown bag and park bench set, poor people still find ways to knock a few back:

In late 2006, the state prohibited grocery and convenience stores from selling certain alcoholic beverages in most of central Seattle and the University District, including all or portions of downtown, Belltown, lower Queen Anne, Capitol Hill, the Central Area, the International District and Sodo. The city had requested the move, an expansion of an “alcohol impact area” ban that had previously only applied to Pioneer Square.

The restricted booze is mostly relatively low-cost, highly fortified beer and wine that officials think is favored by the people who are chronically drunk on city streets and sidewalks.

These days, though, alcohol distributors are skirting the ban by selling the same products under different labels, Scales said. For now, the state Liquor Control Board should add additional products to the prohibition, he said. The long-term solution requires the ban be driven by a formula based on alcohol content, not brand names, some city officials say…

“There are thousands and thousands of beer and wine products out there, and to use a formula base, that’s a very broad brush that could impact thousands of products,” [Liquor Board chairwoman Lorraine] Lee said. “There’s no one formula that’s going to capture exactly what the (chronic public inebriates) are drinking.”

This isn’t the first time that Seattle has lamented that drinkers find substitutes when access to their first options is restricted. And as Radley Balko has noted, there’s an undeniable tinge of classism to this kind of legislation.

A quick rave for Central Liquors: Located at 917 F. St NW, Central Liquors has become my go-to spot for hard to find bottles. The store has limited shelf space, but uses it well to stock a selection of high quality, esoteric items you won’t easily find elsewhere in Washington, DC, and definitely not in the state run liquor stores I’m stuck with in Virginia. I went in a few weeks ago and asked the clerk if they ever carry creme de violette, an obscure liqueur flavored with violet flowers that hasn’t been widely available in the U.S. for decades. “We used to,” he said. “But nobody ever buys it.”

“Will you carry it again?” I asked.

“No, I don’t think so.” And that, I thought, was the end of that. I already had one bottle at home that I’d ordered from England and figured I’d have to carefully ration it until I get my hands on more.

I dropped in again recently to pick up something else. As I was checking out, the guy at the counter asked me if I’d called in a special order, nodding his head toward a lone bottle sitting on a shelf behind the counter. And there it was, creme de violette! He wasn’t the person I’d spoken with before, but apparently I’d bought enough strange bottles there to be recognizable. After making sure it really was mine and not someone else’s special order, I was on my way with a bonus acquisition.

There are some subtle differences between the two creme de violettes. The one I had imported, from Deniset Klainguer, is all sweetness and flower petals. The one I bought in DC, Rothman and Winter, has a little must in the aroma and lower proof. Overall, I like the DK a little better, but they’re both excellent in a mixed drink.

Why does this matter? Because creme de violette is an essential ingredient in one of the greatest cocktails ever made. Walk into any bar in America and ask for an Aviation and you’ll probably get a blank stare from the bartender. Walk into a really good bar and you’ll get one of these:

1.5 oz gin
.5 oz lemon juice
.5 oz maraschino liqueur

That’s a perfectly good cocktail. Anything that starts with gin is on the right track, the lemon is a nice counterpoint, and the unique flavor or maraschino takes this a step above the average drink. (Maraschino deserves a post of its own. Suffice it to say that what passes for maraschino cherries in bars today is a pox upon mixology. Good maraschino liqueur tastes a bit of cherries, but really expresses the nuttiness that comes from the pits. It doesn’t have anything to do with the red-dyed, corn syrup-infused travesties of a cherry you find at the grocery store. Luxardo is considered the best brand. You can get it at Central Liquor too.)

But walk into a great bar and you’ll get something like this:

2 oz gin
.5 oz lemon juice
.5 oz maraschino
.5 oz creme de violette

Now, my friends, you’ve got yourself a drink. It’s got amazing complexity: the botanicals of gin, the tartness of citrus, the nuttiness of maraschino, the floral notes of violet flowers. And the color! It’s a vibrant purple with a hint of gray. The kind of purple cocktail a man would drink. Elegant. Beautiful. Just the way it was made before Prohibition.

If I had to choose one cocktail to drink for the rest of my life, this might be it. And now that I can get a steady supply of this liqueur, that’s pretty much what I’ve been doing this month.

Our government, unfortunately, has decided that paying humorless drones to evaluate alcohol labels is a worthwhile use of taxpayer money. They’re the reason why Lagunitas’ “Chronic” ale now bears a big “Censored” label and why St. George Absinthe Verte features a contemplative monkey rather than a monkey playing drums. The regulators have struck again:

Vaune Dillmann thought the wording on his bottle caps was just a clever play on the name of the Northern California town where he brews his beer — Weed.

Federal alcohol regulators thought differently. They have ordered Dillmann to stop selling beer bottles with caps that read “Try Legal Weed.” …

But illegal drugs are no joke to the federal agency, which maintains meticulous rules about labeling. Drug references on alcoholic beverages were banned in 1994, agency spokesman Art Resnick said.

“We protect consumers of alcohol beverages against misleading advertising and labeling. That’s one of our primary functions. That’s what we do, as well as collect taxes,” he said.

The ruling is not so amusing to Dillman, who just dropped $10,000 on 400,000 bottle caps he can no longer use. And the man’s got a good point:

[The] native of Milwaukee said he wonders how some other brewers have gotten away with the names for their products, such as Hemp Ale or Dead Guy Ale. And he can’t understand how his label has run afoul of federal alcohol regulators who must surely be aware of one of the most famous advertising slogans in American marketing: “This Bud’s for you.”

[Via Slashfood.]

Raise your hand if you’ve ever seen an underage kid enjoying a rich, malty barley wine ale. No one? Didn’t think so. But a bill in Vermont that would raise the alcohol limit on beers sold in grocery stores is being held up by legislators who think that teens aiming to get drunk would choose expensive craft brews over the usual cheap beer and mass market wine:

State officials, however, are actively fighting passage of H.94 because they worry that consumers, particularly underage drinkers, will imbibe the more potent craft brews as they would mass-produced, low-alcohol content beers. This potentiality, they say, poses a threat to public health and safety…

Michael Hogan, commissioner of the Vermont Department of Liquor Control, opposes the bill. He is concerned that most people, particularly teenagers, are unaware of “the potency of these products,” which he says would be increasing from a low of 5 percent to as high as 16 percent.

Is Hogan so insanely devoted to his mission that he actually believes this, or is this just a convenient excuse for maintaining the state liquor stores’ current monopoly on high-alcohol beers? Regardless, these brews are an acquired taste, especially for a neophyte beer drinker on a teenager’s budget. Allowing their sale in grocery stores is unlikely to have much of an impact on teenage drinking, but it would make things a lot easier for the adults who want to buy them and the many Vermont breweries who’d like to make them.

(That said, if we actually could get high schoolers hooked on Belgian-style trippels instead of Bud and Miller, the world would become a much better place for beer lovers.)