Homebrew
Osok reminds me of my Dad's attempts at homebrew. Many was the occasion when I was young that we'd share the house with a large plastic bucket fermenting beer, or a range of demijohns in which elderberry wine or something of the sort was coming into being. All these concoctions were reasonably successful, which encouraged Dad to have a go at ginger beer. Not your wimpy Idris stuff - oh, no. Proper, hair-on-your-chest ginger beer.

Having got to the bottling stage, he took the crates of full bottles into the garage to settle and mature.

One Saturday lunchtime, we heard a pop and a bang. Followed by another.

You know how the chain reaction in fission reactors and atomic bombs works? That a neutron (Is it a neutron? I presume it must be...) bumps into an unstable nucleus, causing it to decay into a different element and releasing more neutrons that repeat the process in a cascade? Well, it was like that - with comparable explosive power. The explosion of the first bottle set off the ones next to it, which, in turn...

Naturally, Dad wanted to rescue the situation - and the car, which was in the garage - which meant retrieving the crates of death. Not entirely foolishly, he decided that he needed to wear goggles for the operation. Goggles that were kept in his workroom. In the garage.

Somehow, he made it. Somehow he got the crates from the garage onto the drive without causing major injury. Once outside, the warmth of the spring sun did its work, and every last bottle exploded.

He'd wanted it strong...
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 14:51, 23 replies)

Reactors
at least it wasn't a fusion reaction. Masses of heat and a huuuuuuuuuge ginger thing as a consequence thereof.
(Eds Meds Mathskillz=1,Socialskillz=0, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 14:53, closed)

After drinking strangely named brews over there
I've decided that if I start brewing my own it will have equally odd names- so instead of things like Sneck Lifter, it will be called Badger's Nadgers or Bishop's Ringpiece, or something equally unsettling.

I can't wait to start trying.
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Tue 8 Apr 2008, 14:58, closed)

@TRL
"Cassock Fumbler" sprang to mind reading that...
( Cawl, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 14:59, closed)

Hmmm names
Maiden's Gusset?

Ye Olde Elastic Loosener?
(osok Rebel without a clue, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:03, closed)

I made
strawberry wine that behaved in a similar way.

If I had a real ale I'd call it "Evil Real Ale That Made Me Vomit All Day Thursday". That, or "Kitten's Bollocks". Or "Ladygarden Special".

Pint of Ladygarden, please.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:08, closed)

As a young lad
and being poor and underage, I made homebrew lager. Me and my friends then discovered my mum and dads homemade cider in the garage, so we decided to make homebrew snakebite.

But we were lacking any ribena, so obviously the next best thing to use was Martini Bianco.

Just say No kids.

Incidentally, I had an excellent pint called "Naked Ladies", clearly we choose it just so we could go to the bar and ask for two naked ladies. Little things make me smile.
(Bazongaloid, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:18, closed)

@Al...
At his stag night 18 months ago, my brother and his friends introduced me to the turbo-shandy. Half a pint of lager with a Smirnoff Ice thrown in.

Oh my holy Jesus.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:20, closed)

Aaaaah, the turbo shandy
It makes festivals special. Or at least, it makes festival beer drinkable.

I once spent a night in Rockworld at Jillys drinking nothing but peach Bacardi Breezers, every one of which was strawpedoed. We got odd looks for that one.
(Bazongaloid, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:21, closed)

Ah... Turboshandy!
A particular friend of mine and I came up with the fantastic idea of getting a pint of snakebite and black, and adding a few shots of vodka to it.

Backward rural chap that I am, this was christened "Red Diesel".
( Cawl, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:25, closed)

Cheeky Vimto
Port and Blue WKD.

Tastes just like Vimto, and you fall over. Excellent.

Usually a pint or two of that towards the end of the night rapidly brings about, er, the end of the night.
(Reverend Fister "a disciplined fuckwit", Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:27, closed)

west coast gin
Can you get West Coast Cooler in Engerland? I haven't seen it since Ireland. It's a foul tropical fruit alcopop but was around before alcopops became big.

It tastes great with gin.

However, after a few pint glasses of gin and West Coast Cooler, one becomes slightly suggestible, which is how I ended up in a float procession, hammered, wearing a bisto fake tan, a bikini and a grass skirt. I was 18 and had never worn a bikini in my life before. The local papers preserved the occasion for me in glorious black and white.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:29, closed)

OK
Spiders in Hull is a club at which you can buy a drink claiming to be a Pan-Galactic Gargle-Blaster.

Take one pint glass. Throw in a shot each of vodka, Galiano and Pernod. Add a dash of black and a baby bottle of OJ. Throw in some ice, and top up with dry cider.

Charge £2.80 for the lot. (At least, that's what it cost in 1998, when I was last there.)
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:30, closed)

I'm taking notes.
I think we may need to start our own brewpub at this rate, just so we can use these names...
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:37, closed)

Toxic Death
Firstly you need a pub with a top shelf lined with dusty ominous bottles. You then take a half pint glass, and proceed from one end adding a shot from each until full.

If topped with crushed crisps, this is known as an 'Engineer'.
(osok Rebel without a clue, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 15:57, closed)

^^^
Brilliant, but why topped with crisps?
(Bazongaloid, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 16:06, closed)

Green Bastard
Here's the recipe:

Take one pint glass, still hot to the touch from the glass-washer.

Add a shot of Blue Curaco
Add a shot of Vodka
Fill to the top of the glass with lager of the patron's choice

et viola! Instant idiot.
(Bicycle Repairman "you're also a bit of a wanker", Tue 8 Apr 2008, 16:07, closed)

Takes me back
My formative years were spent amidst the mid-late 80s crusty traveller/free festival scene, consequently I knew some pretty thirsty chaps.

One of them, Bod, invented Sherrydown - drink half your bottle of Merrydown Cider, then fill to the brim with sherry. Ouch.

A girl on the same circuit used to drink Special Brew/Diamond White snakebites - now THAT's fucking turbo.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 16:26, closed)

Althegeordie
Allegedly the tipple of choice among Royal Engineers. A pickled egg is also optional.

I discovered it on the night of my 21st. With parachuting to be done nice and early the next morning. Thank god for bad weather cancelling flying is all I can say, as I was slumped semi-conscious and drooling in the corner of the hangar.
(osok Rebel without a clue, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 16:52, closed)

Jeez, I'm feeling reminiscently sick...
Castaway + Diamond White in a pint glass = Blastaway.
We also drank Duckhams (is that how to spell it?) as in motor oil. I think it started off as a snakebite plus - no, it was half cider, half guiness plus a shot of blue curacao...

Saw a bloke in Edinburgh drinking guiness with Tia Maria - sounds nice.
( Tourette's ( . )( . ) has a monkey hair in her fried egg, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 17:14, closed)

Real Ale
This may well end up in a future booze related QOTW. A few years back I cycled up to the Chapel Beer Festival in Essex, roughly six miles from my home with the intention of downing a few late summer ales with friends.

At 8pm I was ordering my second pint of Scrote's Old Dog's Dick

At 9pm I had eschewed British ales in favour of the Belgian stuff, using the time honored technique of if-it-aint-seven-percent-or-above-then-avoid-it.

By 9:30pm I was drinking De Schleuw's Schtop Schagg

By 10:30 I was Legoed.

By 11:00 I was throwing the last of the granular dregs onto the ground, cursing loudly and attempting to negotiate a set of steps with a bike slung over my shoulder.

A plan formulated in my head which involved a small detour to the local late night Shell for a sarnie. Wobbling slightly, I threw a leg over the bike and pedalled in the general direction of away.

Some time later, with a closed Shell garage nearby and roughly four miles off course, I nipped down a quiet country road to relieve my bulging bladder. I propped the bike up against a tree, unzipped in the dark and sighed at the blessed relief.

At that exact moment, the 23:47 to Colchester went past, lit up like Times Square, illuminating my knob for miles around.

Undeterred, I grabbed my bike and swung a leg over the saddle. Strangely enough, the next thing I knew I was lying in a ditch with a bike on top of me and my fly unzipped.

I rolled in home at around 1am and woke up feeling like a French person had slept in my mouth.
(Bicycle Repairman "you're also a bit of a wanker", Tue 8 Apr 2008, 17:53, closed)

ahhh
i fucking love turbo shandys.

I've been teaching American bartenders about the chavvy joy of lager and lime and guiness and black.

Some Irish guys came into the pub I work in the other day and bought me shots of the Four Horsemen...

Jose Cuervo
Jack Daniels
Johnny Walker
Jagermiester

Oh dear god I threw up all over the shop.
(little fawn, Tue 8 Apr 2008, 22:13, closed)

Excellent
If fate should find you at the corner of Haight Street and Masonic Avenue in San Francisco some February, then head on into the Magnolia Pub & Brewery for a glass of Old Thunderpussy Barleywine (11.3% abv). Actually, even if they don't have the stuff at the time, stop by anyway. The Proving Ground IPA and Stout of Circumstance are particularly good, and hand-pumped, cask-conditioned ale is always available.

edit: Also in the Drinking in San Francisco category, be sure to have some Fernet. Fernet is what Jägermeister wants to be when it grows up.
(tellum0 is spelled with an 'o', Wed 9 Apr 2008, 8:21, closed)

Fernet?
The ideal hangover cure. Drink one, ten minutes later drink another. It works. Discovered in Salou, Spain in 1984. Never forgotten.
(porkylips looks better as the sun goes down., Wed 9 Apr 2008, 10:41, closed)