Sip

The jagged mountainsides and lush valleys of Costa Rica are dotted with small fields of sugar cane, and have been for centuries. The distillation of cane juice into rum has been practiced throughout Latin America and the Caribbean for ages, but in some special places they distill it into something much more akin to vodka. This delightful and surprising concoction is Guaro.

If you’ve been alternating between baking in the blistering sun and riding blissfully along the rolling waves that grace the surf of the Nicoya Penninsula on the Pacific side of Costa Rica, and you find yourself at a local Soda (a Costa Rican “bar”), you may be presented with some Guaro. You will likely have to ask for it, since tourist types are generally offered the drinks they tend to buy, like daiquiris (actually from Cuba) or Margaritas (Mexico) or beer. But if you ask for Guaro, the nod of recognition alone is worth the price of the shot. But be aware, the Costa Rican government nationalized production of Guaro in 1851 to try to stop bootlegging. In 2019 there were apparently 19 deaths in Costa Rica tied to consuming illicit and tainted Guaro. So get the real stuff.

This is not a spirit with a powerful character. It will not assault your senses with smoke, vanilla, peat, or fruit-forward aromas. It tastes like what would happen if you put some reasonably good vodka into an empty rum bottle, sang a pirate sea shanty to it, then poured it into a shot glass. To my tongue, the star of this show is the limón. These gorgeous little buggers grow everywhere and have a unique flavor somewhere between lemon, lime, and sour orange. Taste the Guaro, chase it with a quick suck on a limón slice, let your senses drink it all in. The waves are kissing the beach, the jungle is humming with life, the howler monkeys are grunting and barking their way through the trees, and your mosquito bites no longer itch as the citrus and Guaro gently pulse comfort through your veins.

If you’re feeling brave, follow it with another, or a chilled Imperial beer (the Costa Rican beer, and another blog entry for another time) and then hit the muddy trail to the nearby waterfalls for a swim. Just watch out for the howler monkeys, as their primary reaction to seeing people below them is to piss downward. Easy enough to avoid, but good to know about. Pura vida!

For the Maya, who bathed the steaming hot jungles of the Yucatan in sacrificial blood from atop stone pyramids, the mystical ones among them who could vanish like smoke and invade your mind, shape-shift, the ones we would call something like “Wizard,” were called Nahual. Yes, there are lots of spellings, interpretations, and I can hear the nitpickers wanting to comment on this word, but this blog has no comments, so there it is. Onward.

Those same Maya also shared a tradition with the much of the world in the form of a sweat lodge, a squat earthen dome with a pit in the center for red hot stones to be placed. Here people are baked like loaves of bread until their souls come unglued and drift out with the incense and steam. This is El Temazcal and the experience will haunt my dreams for the rest of my life. Emerging from this domed womb soaking wet with the mingled sweat and tears of myself and my fellow travellers, I guzzled a gallon of water, fell to the ground, and slept. When I awoke, I made my way to the seashore and, walking in the blazing sun along the powdery sand, I stumbled across a lonely bar. The man who ran the place must have seen the shaken, aimlessness on my face and he offered me a seat and told me about El Nahual.

While there is ample history and countless flowery stories surrounding El Nahual, in this case he was describing the local cocktail. It is a bold blend, made from mezcal, juiced tamarindo with guajillo chili, lime juice, and bitters of Oaxacan mole. *Please forgive the lack of accents and odd spelling, much of this blog is done on a barely usable old laptop.

The first thing that struck and delighted me about this fermented wonder is that it is, for me, the perfect amount of sweetness (which is essentially none) because of the fruit, but the kick of the chili wrestles whatever sugar your mouth is sensing hopelessly to the ground and hits it in the face with its own hands. There is mezcal, there is mole, there is chili, so there is no doubt about where you are. Because this cocktail feels more like a spiced snack, you may feel like you can enjoy a few of them. And that is why it is the Wizard, my friends. What seems like a kindly old fella with stories to tell you turns out quickly to have stolen your senses, spun you around several times, and set your stomach on fire. His spells are best taken in small doses. Enough to dream on, but not so much that you wake up transformed into an iguana.

I haven’t posted a sip review in quite a long time now. If I’m honest it’s because 2020 was such a struggle that doing even the simplest thing felt like a Herculean task. But this isn’t a blog about depression, it’s about regional boozes and my impressions of them. 

I don’t think I need to dive deep into politics, which I’m loath to do anyway, to explain that the 2020 presidential election was a weirdly disturbing affair. The mere mention of it will, doubtless, send anyone reading this running to their side of the battlefield, ready to take up arms. Trumpism took hold of half of us with a fierce grip, and anti-Trumpism the other half. We drew bizarre lines in our imaginary sand and declared that crossing them meant you were pure evil. Rage and hate hung in the air like a thick fog, youth suicide skyrocketed, and America as a whole felt like a drug crazed party gone horribly wrong and devolving into a fiery riot. 

January is typically a sober month for me, and this one had been so far. But I decided that the inauguration and transition out of the Trump era (one can hope) and into a more peaceful age warranted a break from my dry January doldrums and the popping of a good champagne.

Before anyone reading this gets started on that tiresome tirade about how it’s not champagne unless it’s from that region in France and made in a very specific way, we all know that. This is a “sparkling wine” from Argyle Winery in Newberg, Oregon. I am calling it champagne because I use that word to describe the thing we drink in celebration of something. There are those who will wag their finger at me for this, and those who understand it and use “champagne” the same way. So be it. We all know you’re technically right, and that the name “champagne” is exclusive to a very specific French beverage, but we’ll use it wrong anyway, and we’ll fight for our right to be wrong to the end. This isn’t about your facts, it’s about our freedom to use the wrong word and not be judged!

This particular bottle was a 2016 blend from the Willamette Valley of 55% Chardonnay, 35% Pinot Noir, and 10% Pinot Meuner that is bottle fermented and described, rather unappealingly, on the bottle as “disgorged on-demand.” A process that immediately brings to mind a series of rather revolting images of having enjoyed too much of it.

I watched the inaugural proceedings with a nervous dread. A sniper’s bullet, or rogue pipe bomb, or something awful that I couldn’t imagine seemed inevitable. America felt like a place that simply couldn’t pull off a peaceful transfer of power anymore. And when the swearing in was done and things started to feel like they might not catch on fire, I treated myself to a rather large goblet of the bubbly.

A tip of the hat is in order for Argyle. This fizzy treat has almost no sweetness, thank all that’s holy, but instead has a bone-dry toasted, woody essence. A faint hint of hazelnut (more on the nose than the tongue) with just the slightest green apple tartness to it. Truly delightful across the whole mouth and with lingering warm tones of oak and fresh baked bread that drift like a soft breeze through your entire head.

As I enjoyed the feeling of spreading heat radiating from my belly, I could feel my neck and shoulders start to slowly relax back down to where they belong and yet had not been in what felt like years. I knew full well that the road ahead was full of battles for our bitterly divided nation, but if we can make a drink this delicious then we can do anything.

Many thanks to Argyle Winery for producing such a perfect companion to this moment, and such a tasty way to celebrate it.

Park City, Utah is a picturesque town tucked in the mountains and designed to look strikingly like a movie set.  If you picture a quaint ski resort town, bustling with attractive people in puffy coats and designer boots, you won’t be wrong.  In the shadowy basement bar of The Cabin, a music venue buried under the glamorous surface of Park City, I ask the bartender what local booze embodies Park City.

He looks flustered, confused, then asks what I want.

I ask him, “What is brewed or distilled locally here that you think is the trademark of the town?”

He scowls for a moment and says, “I don’t like it.  I think it’s bitter and too strong because it’s 9%, but everyone says the Hop Rising put Park City on the map.  Hell, it put Utah on the map. The last time I tried it I got a DUI, so I don’t like the stuff.”

I’m intrigued.

He’s right about the bitterness, but then I’m a fan of that.  It’s surprisingly malty tasting for an American IPA, but very easy on the tongue.  When a wind-burned man in a charcoal trench coat steps up to the bar next to me, he looks at the bottle and says, “Ah, you like the Squatters IPA, huh?” I nod.  He points to it and says, “Man, that beer put Park City on the map. People think Utah, they think watered down lagers, but when that came out the rest of the country was like, ‘Woah, this came out of Utah?’”

I smile and have another taste.  It holds up, still bitter and delightful.

Later, in a different part of the bar, chatting with a couple from Salt Lake City, they ask me what I’m drinking and if I want another.  Very friendly people out here. I say it’s Squatters Hop Rising IPA and they tell me that beer really put Park City on the map. I’m not kidding.

So it seems clear there is some kind of Utah script they hand out to residents instructing them on the talking points around their beverages.  If you want to sound like a local, make sure to point out that the tasty Hop Rising you’re enjoying really put the place on the map. Nobody will suspect you’re an outsider.

This is the least hoppy beer I may have ever tasted. It is also apparently supposed to be poured over ice, making the already very light, almost watery beer, that much more diluted. However, if it’s a hot day in Chiba and you just want to cool off, go for it.

It’s also very helpful that if you don’t speak Japanese and you’re in a bar where no English is spoken, you can just say “hoppy” and they’ll know what you mean. So it’s got that going for it.

Japan and sake go way, way back. So far back that the origins of sake are a bit vague, fading and disintegrating into dust as the records get older. A 3rd century Chinese text, “Records of the Three Kingdoms” refers to the Japanese as drinking something like it and dancing. It wasn’t until the 16th century that knowledge of distillation came to Japan and the drink known as “Imo-sake” started being made by monks in temples around Kyoto. With that in mind, I headed to an unbelievably tiny restaurant in Kyoto, praised for the sashimi made nightly there by the smiling old couple who own the place.

I’m a big fan of hot sake. The warmth spreading from your mouth up into your face and then languidly out along your limbs on a chilly evening is bliss. It has a smooth, slightly nutty aroma and taste that gently reminds you of the rice it’s fermented from. But on this particular evening I’m told by the old man that “Hot sake means not good. Cold means good.” In the spirit of imbibing as the locals do, I sample the chilled sake and find that when served cold there is simply less of the flavors that I prefer. They’re still there, but tamed down a bit by the cold. Also, while the rainy chill in the air is taken away a little by the drink, tasted from the unbelievably cute tiny cups it is poured into, I find that served warm it’s a more powerful weapon against the wintry weather.

The sake business in Japan took a pounding during World War II from rice shortages and the introduction of beers and western liquors, the sexy newcomers to the party. Sake’s popularity has steadily declined in Japan ever since, with fewer and fewer brewers in operation every year. Along with a growing fascination with things western, the Japanese seem to have lost interest in this drink as old as their nation. Strangely though the popularity has been increasing throughout most of the rest of the world, where sake is brewed and enjoyed more and more every year.

“Nihonshu no Hi,” Japan’s official World Sake Day, is October 1 every year, which is a perfect time of year to enjoy a sip of this smooth, warming brew. If you haven’t tried it, give it a taste, both chilled and warm. See what you prefer. Write a haiku and say a thank you to those monks of Japan’s ancient past who pioneered this tasty drink and danced the night away.

After a long flight, a night in a crumbling, moldy motel, a full day’s bus ride sitting next to a man with a violently screaming anus, a taxi ride with a raging driver who won’t stop yelling stories about Uber drivers raping and murdering anyone who gets in their car, and a few miles of trekking through the sleet with your guitar, the idea of a drink sounds pretty damned good. If you’re in this part of China the only drink you’re going to find is one made by the Chinese government. That means the bottle with the red star.

When I arrived and found the corner store it was clear very quickly that things were going to be a bit different here. The smiles of Vietnam, bright as a Saigon sunrise, were long gone. The Chinese know how to work, and there is a sense in the air of intention to get shit done. There is also a taste palette that strays far beyond the wildest fringes of Western exploration. What we call “Chinese food” in America is not remotely the food of China. As an example, the corner stores stock snacks of chicken feet, in case you’re feeling a bit hungry.

My goal was not a chicken foot though, I was looking for a drink. Lo and behold, there on the shelf was a stock of the government approved Red Star booze. Not knowing what I was in for, I also picked up a bottle of something that looked like 7-Up, just in case.

I had scrounged up a bed to sleep in on the outskirts of the Mutianyu village and, after shaking off the snow and cracking open the bottle, I poured myself two fingers of the stuff. Immediately I thought I had made some sort of terrible mistake and purchased a paint stripper or automotive cleaner of some kind. It smelled strongly of industrial solvent and the taste went straight to the heat, bitter, and caution parts of my tongue. Immediately I felt an alarming burning in my gut and feared that I had ingested something toxic. I don’t speak any of the countless Chinese languages, and don’t have the first idea what I’d do in case of an accidental self-poisoning while visiting. There is no phone that I know of and as I wheeze and hack into the sink I wonder if I’ll die here, staring wistfully out into the snowy countryside at broken pieces of the Great Wall in the snow like massive gnarled teeth across a mountain range.

After a few breaths I started to feel reassured that it wasn’t a poison or engine cleaning compound, just the local booze. I tried adding a splash of the clear soda in hopes that some candy flavoring might make it taste a little more cocktail-like, but no dice. In fact, it was worse. Now it just tasted like jet fuel that somehow was infused with cotton candy. Or perhaps like a child with an armful of snow cones had fallen tragically into a vat of vodka, pissing herself while falling, then been pulverized by merciless machines into a government regulated spirit intended only for new recruits at boot camp as a test of their patriotism.

I was not, dear reader, able to finish the pint. But that night I slept like the dead and awoke the next morning to blazing blue skies and a walk along the Great Wall that was subtly infused with the dreams the Red Star bottle had planted in me. China has a magic to it that is unlike anywhere else. Their weird fear of the internet, distrust of the outside world, and faintly toxic boozes are only part of the picture. If you can make it to China to see it for yourself, I highly recommend it. I would, however, avoid the Red Star booze.

In your soggy shorts and shirt, skin soaked with the fevered mixture of sweat and humid tropical air, it can be tempting to reach for a glass of anything liquid that a smiling local hands you. When it’s presented with a giant roll of cinnamon bark and a fragrant, fresh plumeria blossom it’s simply irresistible. If that smiling local is a pretty Vietnamese girl who looks like she has her own personal air conditioned cloud cooling her every move, you not only take the drink but you genuinely now expect it to change your life. You are drenched in sweat and the air is thick with steam and the sounds of insects and this tiny glass promises a pause, some grace.

As if all that isn’t enough, she then softly, in her lullaby accent, tells you, almost singing the words, “It mountain spirit. Son mean mountain, Tinh mean spirit. Mountain spirit! Make with herbs and fruits from mountains.”

She even leads you gently over to the antique, pre-war bar where the bottles are kept. It must be leftover from Vietnam’s long stretch as a French colony. It’s a massive dark wood masterpiece from a time when a bar was akin to a cathedral. A destination bar to which supplicants could kneel and offer themselves in divine contemplation.

When you bring the glass to your nose to sniff the stuff it’s astonishing how much it reeks of the aftershave your grandfather wore, perhaps tainted slightly with turpentine or rubbing alcohol. The “mountain herbs” she mentioned are apparently the same ones used to make Old Spice. But she is looking into your eyes, judging, waiting to see pleasure there. For a moment you focus your will into your eyes, then outward to your whole face, willing it to say, “Oh my, that smells delicious!” And it seems to work, since she smiles and all is right with the world.

You take the glass to your table and sit, wetting the seat cushion with your sweat-damp shorts. Knowing you’ll likely be drinking aftershave, you stare into the glass, pondering the burnt caramel colored stuff. Knowing she’ll ask what you think soon you put it to your lips and give in.

The taste is as you’d expect. Old Spice with a touch of smoke and something vaguely medicinal, almost like some kind of cough suppressant. It’s not the worst thing you’ve ever tried, but it doesn’t require any further testing. If you were a guerrilla fighter hiding out in the jungle, swarmed by mosquitoes and in fear for your life, this stuff would provide some comfort. It would likely help you get some sleep. Also, it could be used to soothe your face after shaving with a hunting knife, and possibly as an antiseptic on any wounds you might get while stalking the enemy through the bush. But this is not what you tell her when she comes to your table and gives you a questioning smile, asking, “So?”

“Oh, it’s delicious,” you lie to her face, “I’d have another but I have to get going.”

Feeling slightly closer now to the foreign soldiers who struggled here, and the local ones as well, you walk out into the warm evening air and feel the fiery comfort spreading out from your stomach and into your limbs. This must be what the mountain’s spirit feels like.

In southeast Asia rum seems to dominate the landscape like banana palms or tuk-tuk taxis. In Thailand, the rum is almost always SangSom. If a pirate has a leather-bound flask attached to his hip, this is likely the rum that’s in it. Not the fancy stuff, just a deep golden, powerful sugar cane liquor that tastes like a warm tropical breeze and makes your belly feel like it has been blessed by Buddha. I was introduced to SangSom by unnervingly friendly locals when I asked what was available to drink.

“Water,” I was told, “or Happy Water. Both good, but one makes you happier.” Since Buddhists aren’t supposed to drink alcohol, this surprised me. But enjoying this rum in admirably small amounts seems to be a national pastime. As a friend here told me, “Follow all the Buddha’s directives and you are enlightened. Follow most of them and you are human.”

I have seen people mix it with root beer, soda water, sprite, tonic, just about anything you can imagine, but usually fruit juice. My personal favorite concoction with SangSom is to pour lime juice over ice, then the rum, then top it off with coconut water, preferably fresh from the coconut, but work with whatever you’ve got. As anyone who reads these knows, I’m not a fan of sweet drinks, so working with rum’s natural sweetness requires either no mixer at all or something very very simple, preferably acidic to fight off the scurvy from months at sea.

It says right on the bottle that it’s “Special Rum” and I’d have to agree. Honestly, if you can manage to have the locals call you “Happy Water” then you must be special, right? I haven’t left Thailand yet as I write this and so far it has a perfect record. Every time there is a bottle of this on the table, those sitting at that table part ways as new found friends. Much like Italian wines, which have a truly magical ability to bring people together around a table, this rum carries some kind of ancient Siamese sorcery in it and seems to make people light up with smiles all night long until they drift off to dreamland. The headaches the next morning, however, I think it’s not fair to blame on the rum. After all, it did its job perfectly. In the hot Thai nights it must be chased with plenty of water or you’ll feel the dark side of that same magic.

The verdant island of Penang, just barely off the coast of Malaysia, is hot and humid during the days, and barely cools down at night. Locals started brewing a drink they call “Tuak” (pronounced “twock” but also called “Toddy”) so long ago that nobody seems to remember where it started or how. I’m sure this could be found out, but neither I nor anyone I chatted with had enough energy in the heat to dig deeper.

It is brewed by fermenting the sap and/or flower from the coconut palm, with yeast and sugar, but only for a very short time. Generally they only let it ferment for about 1 day, which results in a drink with about the same alcohol content as a kombucha, about 0.5% or so. It is technically a palm wine and if brewed for longer periods, sometimes up to a week, it can get much more potent.

It gets bottled into whatever is around, which is most often used plastic water bottles. Above you can see my new friend Tiger pouring ours into plastic cups. Tuak houses (“Kedai Tuak”) are scattered around all the neighborhoods in Penang and the people who brew and serve it charge little to nothing for cups of the stuff. It’s viewed as a social service to bring the neighborhood together, so often it happens in a garage or front yard under some kind of merciful shade.

The taste is a bit sweet, alcohol strength depends on brewing time, and only mildly like coconut. It’s not refrigerated, so it’s not cold, and yet it feels like such a relief from the heat. I can’t put my finger on why it is refreshing or cooling, but somehow it pulls it off. The personality of this humble brew is deeply lethargic, friendly, and open-hearted. While drinking this with locals I found myself regularly engrossed in conversations about historical local war crimes, religious conflicts, and things you would expect to raise tempers, but voices stayed friendly and different faiths coexisted with tolerance and even friendship. If we could make this palm wine into a person it would make an incredibly leader of the U.N. Its magical capacity to cool down the overheated, as well as diffuse conflict and keep conversations civil, would make it a powerful and effective global leader. But for now it can only be enjoyed in a humble plastic tumbler.