Oh, Pucker
This Saturday, Natasha, her main man Farnsworth and I sat at our favorite bar, reflecting on all our good times in 2007 and trying to decide what our drink for 2008 would be. I think it was 2005 when we determined the drink would be scotch, and the habit has stuck with me ever since, so it’s important that I pick the right drink as my annual beverage.
I can’t really get into the specifics yet because we’re still working on the ingredients and I don’t want someone to steal my drink idea and make millions of dollars selling them in souvenir glasses on booze cruises in South Padre Island, but we know for sure that it will have a base of orange vodka. We know this for sure because there is, at present, a bottle of orange vodka chilling in my freezer.
Late on Sunday, against the advice of a wise friend who told me it would be a madhouse, I conned Nat into joining me at a local bar for an airing of the L Word premiere. I refuse to get cable, and the FCC’s crackdown on illegal downloading has left me with few options, but when I got to the bar, there were no less than 7,000 cosmo guzzling, shrieking women staring unblinkingly at the giant flat screen TV’s. I immediately turned around on my heels and sent Nat the simple text message: ABORT!
There’s only so much I’m willing to endure for Jennifer Beals. To recover from my disappointment, I started off on a quest to begin experimenting with our 2008 drink recipes. I walked into the corner liquor store and started wandering down the vodka aisle.
“Can I help you find anything?”
“Uh… no, not yet. Just looking right now.”
“Okay, just let me know if I can help.”
I saw a bottle of grape vodka and started to wonder if maybe we had made a mistake establishing the base as orange vodka. Is grape more versatile? Is orange totally 2006? But what’s done is done, I always say, so I knelt down to look through the rows of liqueurs. Nat had suggested we try chambord as a mixer, but they didn’t have any. I grabbed the closest thing I could find, which was crème de cassis.
As I stood there pondering how cassis (what exactly is a cassis, anyway? a currant?) would taste with orange, I saw what I thought was raspberry liqueur. It turned out to be something called Berry Fusion Pucker, which sounded utterly vile, so I set it back down and headed toward the cashier.
“Hey, if you buy the Pucker, I’ll give you a few bucks off. We’re trying to close it out.”
I glanced at the crème de cassis in my hand, then back at the Pucker, then back at the cassis, and said, “Sold!”
I’m beginning to wonder if my theme for 2008 should really be The Year of the Discount. First I got Cherry Cordial Hershey’s Kisses for 75% off from Target, and here was a total stranger offering to give me $3 off a bottle of Berry Fusion Pucker liqueur just because absolutely no one else would buy it. It’s kind of like winning the lottery. Or at least a free Egg McMuffin in the McDonald’s Monopoly promotion.
So like I said earlier, I can’t get into too many specifics on what else I’m mixing with this 2008 special drink – mostly because all I have so far is the vodka and Pucker – but after a few solo trial runs, suffice it to say that this Pucker’s gonna be good!
Filed under: General on January 8th, 2008
January 7th, 2008 at 10:10 pm
You know if they’re marking down the alcohol to get rid of it, that it’s got to be good…
January 7th, 2008 at 11:30 pm
Is orange vodka the stuff that tastes like an orange creamsicle? If so, then that’s pretty tasty as is.
However, actually trying to watch tv at a bar (and not sports) still sounds so strange to me. Mostly because I become exponentially more anti-social the more into a show I am. What percentage of bar-goers would you guess actually watch the show (assuming conditions so you’d stay)?
January 8th, 2008 at 7:31 am
churlita: that’s exactly what i told myself! plus the dust on the bottle told me it was properly aged.
claire: no, orange vodka is just regular vodka with some orange flavor to it – but creamsicle vodka sounds delish! and at this particular bar, my guess is that 98% of the bar-goers were watching the show. the other 2% were in line for the bathroom.
January 8th, 2008 at 8:04 am
As a former bartender, I can tell you without any reservations that drinking anything involving the word ‘Fusion’ is an invitation to Satan to rise from the depths of hell and visit you where you live. You’ve been warned.
January 8th, 2008 at 8:04 am
As a former bartender, I can tell you without any reservations that drinking anything involving the word ‘Fusion’ is an invitation to Satan to rise from the depths of hell and visit you where you live. You’ve been warned.
January 8th, 2008 at 10:34 am
I’ve been on a Fresca kick lately; it makes a really good mixer! There’s the original citrus flavor, a Berry Fusion flavor! (I think), and a tangerine or somesuch. Anyone of those might be good to go with the vodka, along with some twists of some fruit, or frozen raspberries or something. Yeah, I’m a former bartender too.
And Fresca is no-cal, so you can save all your calories for the vodka itself!
And then you have to name it!
January 8th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Jenny,
Try a little Malibu Rum and two ice cubes with the two flavors and let me know how it is.
January 8th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
sir: i’ll take that under serious consideration.
peggasus: i love fresca and i love raspberries, so that sounds pretty tasty, actually! i’ll let you know how it turns out.
strode: that’s so funny – natasha suggested malibu with the orange vodka and i dismissed it (mostly because rum makes me crazy). but i do love me some coconut, so i’ll give it a shot! maybe i can buy a sample sized bottle just in case it’s gross…
January 8th, 2008 at 4:18 pm
Can I admit to being a bar tv watcher? But mostly because I can never get into the bar scene & need a good distraction.
Best shows to watch at a bar:
Wheel of Fortune (just don’t yell out the answers too loud or people start to think you’re strange)
Strongest Man Contests (people think you’re strange just for watching this one, so yell away)
January 8th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
alicia: you can totally confess to that, as long as you don’t tell anyone that I TOTALLY LOVE STRONGMAN COMPETITIONS!!! when they have to flip a giant log? and when they have to carry enormous cement blocks? and when they do that iron cross thing? LOVE IT!
January 9th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
Omg, Pucker is amazing (all flavors). I once created this drink I called the “Apple of my eye” which consisted of 3 parts ginger ale and 1 part apple pucker…amazing.
Seriously, who sells Berry Pucker at a discount?? That shit is like the greatest stuff out there!!!!!