Words On Wednesday

“Only the strong survive.” Or at least that’s what the bottle tells us. But personally, I’ve tried other spirits that required a substantially stronger stomach. The proof is a little high, but I wouldn’t really call 100 proof notably strong. I suppose it’s some vapid appeal to rugged masculinity, but hey, whatever your schtick is. As for the actual drinking of Yukon Jack Honey, it’s… fine. The initial experience is sweet. As that fades out, you get more sweet. It is an intense sweetness, for sure. The tail end is akin to a mediocre whiskey. It isn’t really good or bad, just whiskey. For the most direct comparison that anyone is likely to have reference for, imagine Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Honey but higher proof. I picked this up because it was on the discount shelf at the liquor store near work. The normal price there is $17.99, but the sale price was $12 for a fifth. At that price point, it’s cheap enough that the quality bar is set extremely low. It doesn’t really have to be great to...

I normally gravitate toward large bottles of liquor for better value, but there is a time and place for shots or mini bottles. The place is here and the time is now. Let's talk about the party bucket from 99 Brand. A coworker was telling me about a recent time when he had some friends over and they got a bunch of different alcohol to try. His personal favorite was a pack of 99 proof mini bottles in a variety of flavors. He claimed they were super cheap (like a buck per bottle) and really good, which is really the name of the game for me. I was really curious to try them for myself. Normally the price per volume of mini bottles makes them cost prohibitive for me, especially if it's something I'd like a full fifth of anyway. The justification here is the plethora of flavors available here, and the fact that I live in a camper right now making storage space a premium. Mini bottles are tiny, hence the name. One recent trip by the grocery store (yesterday), I decided to stop by ...

As I mentioned last month, North Carolina has some super weird liquor laws and pricing policies. However, the monthly scheduling means that I have incentive to try something new each month. Specifically, true to the form of the economic alcoholic, I can pick up one of the cheapest sale items and see how bad it is. So finding the monthly sale items in North Carolina liquor stores is pretty easy. You go to this site , select the current month in the “Month” drop down list, and select Microsoft Excel in the “File Type” drop down list. Then hit “Create Report.” You could also select PDF, but spreadsheets are the superior file type. Fight me. This is where it gets a little funky. For whatever reason, the spreadsheet is in this really weird format, where the headers are vertically merged and there are two empty columns between each populated column. I have no idea why the formatting is so wonky, Google Sheets won’t sort the price columns in the original state. You have to do a little data ma...

As a fan of Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Whiskey, it only makes sense I would be interested in their apple cider offering. Winter Jack Tennessee Cider is “a seasonal blend of apple cider liqueur & Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Whiskey. Is it any good, though? A friend of mine actually informed me of Winter Jack. We were both pretty curious about it, since we enjoy apple cider and Jack Daniel’s individually. Put them together, seems like a pretty solid recipe for success to me. At a price tag equal to standard Jack, but less than half the alcohol content (15% or 30 proof), I was a little hesitant to pick up a bottle. While I do enjoy trying new things, most notably in the Mix-N-Match section at my local Ingles, I have a hard time justifying new distilled spirits. I like more than I dislike in general, but the cost of a whole fifth is hard to stomach, and the premium on smaller sizes is just annoying to me. As such, I *usually* don’t branch out much with liquor. In any case, my friend...

With the holidays coming up, I thought I'd share a super easy recipe that tastes like Christmas. First thing firsts first, you’re here for a recipe, so here you go: OLE SMOKY - NUTMEG DREAM Ingredients 3 oz. Ole Smoky® Shine Nog 1.5 oz. Coffee Liqueur Splash Nutmeg Garnish - Cinnamon Stick Instructions Mix well in a glass over ice Garnish Link: https://olesmoky.com/blogs/recipes/nutmeg-dream Isn’t it nice to have it at the beginning before numerous pages of text? Take note, food bloggers. Now, onto the details. Shine Nog I’ll be the first to admit, I’m not a fan of eggnog. Maybe I just haven’t tried the right brands, but any that I’ve had before left a weird, nauseating flavor in my mouth. I like custard, so I can’t see why I wouldn’t like eggnog, but here we are. Alas, I steer clear of the stuff. A few years back, we were on vacation in Pigeon Forge, TN and we visited the Ole Smoky Distillery. They offered free samples, and I’m certainly not one to t...

Fireball is weird. Not the whisky itself, but rather the culture around it. The legend of Fireball Cinnamon Whisky (or “Dr. McGillicuddy’s Fireball Whisky” as it was originally known) begins in Canada. It seems to have been a mostly local beverage until closer to 2007 when it was rebranded as the Fireball that we know today. The spike in sales and expansion from small town secret to global hit appears to have happened somewhere between 2011 and 2013. It’s amazing what good marketing can accomplish. My first exposure to Fireball was probably around 2010 or 2011 in the early days of its remarkable growth. A friend and classmate absolutely loved Fireball, second only to Southern Comfort. (Or maybe Fireball and then SoCo? I actually don’t know which she preferred between the two.) As I have discussed before , I bought a bottle of Southern Comfort on her recommendation and absolutely hated it. Hence, I decided that anything Megan liked, I would probably hate. I wrote off Fireball as ...