Okay before I begin, I want to define my term. “Most Questionable Vodka” is an award not for a vodka of dubious origin, but rather for a vodka whose design, name, and taste were all odd choices. I have had dubious vodka, both in flavor and quality of manufacture. My friends used to make Skittles vodka which just consisted of putting skittles in a bottle of vodka and tossing it in the freezer for a few days. What I’m saying is that this story is about something whose existence was something you have to come to terms with. With that out of the way, lets go on to the story.
Back when i lived in Santa Fe, I used to go to this bar called Cowgirl a lot. I didn’t really have a lot of money because I was a college student with no job but I went anyways to hang with friends and also grab a drink or two. One night, as we were talking with the bartender, I noticed a bottle at the end of the shelf closest to me. I was immediately curious about this bottle. Why? Because it was a type of vodka I was unfamiliar with? Well yes but it also had one other trait that jumped out: it was green.
Now, I don’t mean that the bottle was green. In fact, the bottle was white frosted glass. I mean the liquid inside was green. And not just green. A BRIGHT green. A neon green. A violent green. To my eyes it seemed to almost glow in the dark bar. You know how some animals are brightly colored to signal that they’re poisonous? Something to keep in mind.
“WHAT is THAT?!” I shouted calmly to the bartender.
With a smile pulled the offending bottle off the shelf and showed it to me so i could read the label. THe brand was Three Olives. The flavor?
“‘Dude’?! The flavor is ‘DUDE’?! What the hell does ‘DUDE’ taste like?!!!” Now, years later i would find out what dudes taste like but more importantly I would like to point out that “what does dude taste like” is not a wise thing to shout in a crowded bar. Luckily, no one noticed, or they were too busy in their own problems to care.
“Oh I have no idea,” said the bartender, “they won’t let us open the bottle until a customer orders it so we can’t taste it but we can’t sell it because we don’t know what it tastes like.”
I thought about it for a whole second, which is about ten years in ADHD time, and made an executive decision. I was going to be that customer.
“I would like a shot of DUDE please!” I said, a little too loudly.
I have never seen a man open a bottle that fast. I mean one second it was back on the shelf where he placed it after showing to to me, and the next he was pouring a shot and no intervening steps could be seen. I mean he broke the sound barrier, the sonic boom momentarily silencing the bar. I mean the top of the bottle disappeared and to this day I have no idea if it was a cork or a screw cap that sealed the contents from the outside world.
I looked at my shot. It was no less green outside the bottle. My enthusiasm faltered slightly. Slightly. I drank it.
Okay there’s really no way around this: it tasted like Mountain Dew. Flat Mountain Dew. Mixed with rubbing alcohol.
I looked at the bartender. He had tasted it too. I could see we had come to the same conclusion. We never talked about it again
He never did charge me for the shot.
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