Top 10

CockTales & Reviews presents, the current top 10. Ron Rio finds itself atop the charts as usual.

1.   Ron Rio Rum - 5.0 The King reigns.

2.   Montego Bay Rum - 4.9 The twin brother, stuck in second place because his parents like Ron better.

3.   Pearl Cucumber Vodka - 4.0 The shocker so far, needs to be constantly kept in stock.

4.   Lunazul Tequila - 3.8 So far the best tasting tequila I have tried.

5.   Pinnacle Cotton Candy Vodka - 3.7 The go-to shot, keep on ice and on hand.

6.   The Kraken Rum - 3.7 A little underrated, great to mix up the regular rum & coke
7.   New Amsterdam Gin - 3.2 The hint of citrus makes this a great every day gin.
8.   181 Merlot Wine - 3.0 So far the only wine to make the cut.
9.   Svedka Vodka - 2.8 Don't let the bottle fool you, there is nothing special inside.
10. Ketel One Vodka - 2.8 The biggest disappointment so far, leave your suit at home.

42 Below Vodka

CockTale: Sorry, I have been spending a lot of time lately with my good friend Ron Rio and have been sorely neglecting the adventure that is discovering new types of alcohol to add to my rotation. It was Saturday night, I had a combo birthday party/family fun night to attend and a liquor store full of possibilities. I settled on 42 Below because I wanted vodka and I didn't want to pay more than $20 for it. I didn't have anyone to impress and figured a new vodka couldn't hurt to try out. Also, when loading my cocktail briefcase this seemed to be a good compliment to the Pinnacle Cotton Candy vodka that would be in my arsenal as well for the evening. 42 Below was only notable to me because it is made in New Zealand, and of course when one thinks of vodka they think of New Zealand......

Review:

Taste: Has the bitter cheap vodka after taste, this is a 100% mixer for sure. Decent when mixed, but what vodka isn't. Sorry, low marks here "2"

Price: $19.99 for a fifth. There are so many decent vodkas out there for $13-$15, why would you ever spend the extra $5 for this? It is probably a $5 surcharge to export this from New Zealand. "1.5"

Novelty: The bottle is boring, in fact it couldn't be less boring if it tried. Nobody has ever heard of this vodka so it wouldn't spark any conversation. 42 Below doesn't move the dial. "1.5"

Hangover Factor: I did some serious damage to this bottle, woke up with minimal side effects. "4"
Drunk: In a word, "mediocre" - there were no adventures, no debauchery and it didn't even get me laid. "2"

Overall, 42 Below vodka is pretty forgettable. Next time, I'll save myself $6 and go with some good old Smirnoff. Because Russians know Vodka, people from New Zealand don't know shit. Overall - "2.2"

181 Merlot Wine

CockTale: I'm not a big fan of wine, I honestly have never opened a bottle of wine by myself. I'm that guy in the wine aisle at the grocery store that wrote the name of the wine my wife asked me to buy, then I have to navigate through the different sections because I have no clue whether it was a Merlot, Cabernet or white. I wouldn't know the first thing about selecting a bottle, so there was a large debate within the CockTales & Reviews staff about whether or not to even include wine in the reviews. But the main point of CockTales & Reviews was to stray from the monotony of my usual cocktail selections, so wine makes the cut on a limited basis. After my wife's birthday dinner at Pomegranate, and if you have never eaten there - run, don't walk to it right away, we stopped by the store to pick up a bottle of 181 Merlot. Mainly this was selected because it was a $20 bottle of wine on sale for $9.99. I strayed from my regular rum and coke and two glasses into 181 Merlot my body started to experience a far different sort of drunk than it regularly does.

Review:
Taste: A little on the sweet side, some of that peppery burn on your tongue that red wine puts off but not as dry as I am used to. Based on my limited experience with wines, I would say it was above average for those that I have tried. - "3.5"
Drunk: Warm, touchy, tingly - body drunk is how I would call it. Very nice. - "4"
Hangover Factor: Dry mouth was a large factor, unquenchable thirst. - "2"
Price: I only paid $9.99, but it is regularly $20.00. At $9.99 it is a decent deal, I can't imagine paying $20 for a bottle of wine. I'm more in the $6-$7 dollar region, so low marks here - "2"
Novelty: If you were to bring this bottle to a party, I think that would probably go over well if the people there knew that this was an above average bottle. "3.5"

I enjoyed wine night, not sure it is going to be a frequent event at our house but fun to mix it up from time to time. Overall, 181 Merlot grades out at a "3"

Svedka Vodka

CockTale: Ever taken an overly inquisitive six year old with you to the liquor store?
You get questions like;
"Hey Dad, isn't this the stuff that pirates drink?" - as he points to the rum section.
"Oh, you like this stuff Dad" - as he points to a bottle of Ron Rio. It just happened to be at his eye level, purely a coincidence I'm sure.
"Dad, is this the store you come to every night to get the stuff for your drinks?" Ok, we might have a problem here.
So I had vodka on my mind, and as you can see - this bottle caught my eye. I consulted my side kick for the trip and he agreed, so Svekda (the #1 vodka of 2033) was my drink of choice for the evening.

Review:

Taste: The first sip of Svedka Vodka had the aftertaste of a cheaper vodka, that sort of sting to your tongue and tingle that the smoother vodkas don't have. Svedka has great mixability, I would definitely recommend it if you plan to go heavy on the mixer, but if you like to taste the vodka in your beverage like a vodka tonic, I wouldn't go with this. "2"

Drunk: I'm going with "clumsy" to describe my drunk, from the moment I started drinking I was dropping things, running into things etc. almost like an insta-drunk feeling that lasted throughout the evening. "3"

Price: $15.95 for a fifth, I don't see any reason to pay that over other mediocre brands of vodka. The extra $2 must be used for their marketing campaign to have that robot tell me it is the #1 vodka of 2033. "2"

Hangover Factor: Minimal. I did some serious damage to the bottle with no residual effects. "4"
Novelty: The bottle is borderline cool, borderline obnoxious - apparently this is a limited edition bottle that induces vertigo. I guess if you brought this to a friends house the bottle would spark a little conversation and the marketing campaign is pretty well known so.... "3"

If Svedka thinks their product is going to be the #1 vodka of 2033, they have quite a bit of work to do between now and then. Overall - "2.8"

New Amsterdam Gin

CockTale: First of all, allow me to apologize for a lack of a post last week. I decided to spend the weekend sober to make sure that I am not turning into an alcoholic. After taking Friday and Saturday night off, I quickly fell off the wagon Sunday and spent the week commiserating with my good friend Ron Rio. During this week with Ron Rio I decided to establish a "drinking team", this team typically consists of me, my wife and Ron. Apparently, drinking by yourself on a Tuesday night is frowned upon, but having a practice with your drinking team is totally acceptable. Now, on to New Amsterdam Gin. I don't know anything about gin, frankly I had no idea where to start when looking for a decent bottle to review. I went with this slick looking bottle because there is a cool building in the back and it didn't look like your average dry London gin. From the smell I thought it seemed very smooth, almost like it had citrus notes to it, then I read the back of the bottle "A modern American Gin, refreshingly balanced with citrus, subtle hints of juniper and sophisticated notes of angelica" I don't have a clue what Angelica is, sounds like a stripper, but I totally called the citrus part, guess I'm turning into quite an expert..........

Review:
Taste: The little bit of citrus flavor really helps when you are mixing this with gin and juice, it would also add a lot more flavor to your average gin and tonic. I liked this gin way more than your regular pine needle taste and could see New Amsterdam becoming one of my go-to gins. "4"
Price: $14.95 for a fifth, moderately priced for other mid shelf gins. The added flavor is worth the extra $2 to upgrade to New Amsterdam over your lower priced bottom shelf gins. "3"
Hangover Factor: This was a shocker to me, no ill effects this morning whatsoever, I made a serious dent in this bottle in not a large time span and woke up this morning feeling just fine. "4.5"
Drunk: Just mediocre, you can't exactly take shots of gin and drinking gin itself doesn't exactly say party time to me, it is more of a relaxing evening tying one on. "2.5"
Novelty: Cool bottle, nothing really special to it other than the citrus flavor - I couldn't exactly give this as a gift and the flavor might not appeal to your regular gin drinker. No name recognition so it isn't going to impress anyone. "2"

I'm glad I chose New Amsterdam Gin for the first gin to be reviewed on CockTales & Reviews because it was far different from other gins I have had in the past and it will be a good barometer to judge other gins in the future. Overall - "3.2"