beingdesh

Tag: Alcohol

  • Who let the Black Dog out?

    I had got this Black Dog bottle from United Spirits for review. I thought I will cook something special for a special guest on a special evening to go along with this special bottle. Probably some fried fish, with crispy potatoes on the side, or some peanut butter toast, or probably some eggs on toast with strawberry jam. I had even thought of steaming some –garlicy-prawn-filled momos or using Whiskey as a medium to make some barbecue sauce. It would have been so special. Although like most of my plans, even this one failed.

    My early memories of Black Dog take me back to this Amrish Puri dialogue from some Meenakshi Sheshadri movie.

    Amrish Puri on Black Dog

    Talk of evil and black dogs running through your blood-stream! Hilarious, representative of 80s cinema, and talks a bit about the brand too. Naughty, bordering on evil, but not harmful in anyway. But it was a few years before I actually tasted alcohol of any kind, leave aside Black Dog.

    I got an opportunity to taste Black Dog for the first time few years back in Bangalore. It was that typical someone-returned-from-US occasion, with couple of bottles of scotch. There was Chivas Regal, and then there was Black Dog. I chose to go the Amrish Puri way. Although the feel of the whiskey was much smoother on the palate than the others I had tasted, the mind wanted it to be rough, slightly naughty, edgy, and a bit dark on humor, as Amrish Puri. And I processed it along with some egg toasts as the evil drink.

    I developed a taste for Scotch in a purely Delhi style later. It was done by sneaking bottles from my friend’s place, setting up a mini-bar in Cars, parking them at Karol Bagh, and eating fried fish and butter laden chicken along with scotch. And yes, we always had them in steel glasses.

    Over the past couple of years I have moved away from Hard Liquors, and mostly stick with Wines and Beers. But then this bottle came along.

    And so shifting to the present times. As I mentioned earlier I had been fiddling with multiple ideas related to this Bottle. But like most things, they didn’t work out.

    I had thrown a party at my place inviting 20+ friends of mine. The menu was a bit playful, I had tossed a few salads and dressed up a few crackers as there was Sangria for company. A lot of Sangria. And there was Mojito. There were Gujju snacks sourced from Ghatkopar, and there was Pani Puri from my favourite roadside cart close to home. I usually organize such parties in afternoon, as it gives people some time to recover post the dozes of alcohol.

    At the fag end of the party few people wanted to do some rounds of Vodka Pani Puri, so I opened up my alcohol cabinet for some Vodka. And I found the Black Dog bottle missing! Gone!

    I rushed to the bedroom and found two of my friends sitting comfortably sipping Black Dog along with rounds of Ghatkopari Gujju snacks. In a moment all my plans went woosh and I snatched away the bottle, rather rudely. But then I felt bad so I left it there and went ahead serving my friends for the rest of the afternoon.

    In the evening when were wrapping everything up we were left with 4-5 friends. And then the two of them came out with half the bottle of Black Dog. We were quite high already from the multiple dozes of alcohol, but we snatched some ice cubes, filled the glasses with it and started sipping it. It was relaxing after a tiring day, slightly refreshing, and was paired perfectly with a lot of friends.

    Isn’t drinking all about that? About friends, about a good chat, and about some relaxing times.

    And yes it is about a bit of naughtiness too. God, I miss Amrish Puri so much.

    Disclosure: Public Relations agency engaged by this brand had sent their product to me for a review. I had mentioned that I don’t usually do product reviews on my blog in my communication with them. For more details refer my disclosure page.

  • The First Sip

    Years ago when I was a kid, I had accidentally discovered and realized the existence of Alcohol. I had stumbled upon a bottle of Whiskey, while looking for something in my Father’s wardrobe. Till that point of time I had seen people drinking on-screen, but I certainly couldn’t imagine my father doing the same. There was something different about that moment when I held the bottle in my hands. Excitement, curiosity, or guilt? All I knew was that I will never drink alcohol when I grow up. There was something extremely repulsive about it back then.

    Slowly things around me were changing, I started noticing the bottles of VAT 69 more prominently than Helen Aunty’s cabaret numbers while watching a 70s movie; I realized that the reason Murali Bhaiya made those brilliant appetizers at Nucleus Club parties – the taste of those egg cutlets and smell of that fish fry still lingers vividly in my memory; I realized that drinking alcohol can be fun, can make uncles go mad in New Year Parties, can lead aunties to talk about behaviour of those uncles and can lead to kids getting excited about it. There was always that bit of excitement in class whenever our Chemistry teacher threw out the name of C2H5OH from his mouth. Few of my friends had taken up smoking and chewing tobacco but drinking alcohol was still faraway.  Alcohol in those days to me was a distant dream and I told to myself, I will never ever smoke. But drinking, yes will consider that for sure.

    Few years later engineering college presented the first opportunity to breakaway for many of us. Of course the stupid cinema of 90s had coloured our thoughts to such an extent that many of us still believed colleges to have sprawling lawns, a healthy sex ratio, more pyaar than padhai and those amazing costumes (girls wearing frocks with puffed shoulders and flowery belts and guys wearing tight jeans with Action shoes). Fortunately (much more than unfortunately) I landed up in a dry state. Although the presence of  lawns in my college was evident, I would rather not comment on the rest of parameters mentioned above.

    Gujarat has been a dry state because Gandhiji was born there. It would have been much more interesting if Gandhiji would have been born in Punjab, very very interesting.

    Despite being a dry state, in Gujarat alcohol is easily available. Be it petrol pumps, paan thelas, soda waalas, almost everyone is a supplier or claims to be one. During my engineering years I still thought about drinking sometimes, but the phattu me (or the law-abiding me) was scared to take the plunge. Maybe I was waiting for the right time, maybe I just found spending money from home on drinking an inappropriate thing. As always I was confused to take a call.

    It was in this state of confusion, (just before the placements, end of 3rd year) we set out on a trip to Abu. I had read about Dilwara temple in school textbooks, and heard stories about Abu Road station’s brilliant omlettes and rabdi from Delhi junta boarding the Ashram express. Although I had never realized that Mt. Abu was flocked by Gujarati tourists for another major reason, to get DRUNK. Legally that is.

    The trip was a memorable one for many reasons. 17 odd guys (and healthy ones) going for a trip packed in one Tempo Trax from Ahmedabad to Mt. Abu; one of my friend showing his ability to sleep anywhere, from railway station platform, to roads, to bus floors; visit to Dilwara temple on the final day of trip; all of us running out of money and a saviour coming up with 1000 Rs. But I will always remember this trip as the one I had my first sip. And what a sip it was!!!

    We gathered some money to buy a bottle of White Mischief (yes almost the cheapest Vodka available), a couple of bottles of Sprite, some lemon and Lays American Cheese and Onion chips. 8 of us sitting, 7 of them have had their first sips, and I was the only debutant. Visibly nervous, I was being constantly lectured by my friends about both the goods and bads of drinking. I was in no position to think that much, my motive was just to go for it. It was a mixture of emotions. Excitement, curiosity, or guilt?

    My friend passed me the glass, adding the caution, tera pehla hai, chota banaya hai. As I held the glass in my hand all those memories and thoughts which I have mentioned earlier passed before me. The strongest vision being of Dev Sahab drinking a Vat 69. Cheers they said and I gulped it.

    All I felt was warmth. I could trace the path through my oesophagus all the way to my stomach. I didn’t feel the sprite, neither did I feel the lemon, it was all warm. And I have had it in one shot.

    Hold the drink they said.

    And I kept on gulping them until I was four down. I was feeling warm in a so-called hill station. Slightly dizzy too. People were talking, and as always I was also talking. It was my first sip, and honestly it wasn’t anything special. It was something very normal. Not a big event as I had anticipated it to be. They asked me to go out for a walk so that I could feel better. But I told them I felt good. Or maybe I still didn’t know how I felt like.

    Was it excitement, curiosity, or guilt?

    As I recollect now this wasn’t actually my first sip. I had Mohua (an Indian liquor produced in tribal areas) at the end of first year, but it was a non-significant event, just had a bit in a dona.

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    What is your story of your first sip?

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    Featured image by Prasoon Gupta