Help becoming a manlier Drinker

I think the problem stems from you not drinking "crappy stuff". You just jumped straight in at vodka-cranberry and now can't drink anything else. It'd be like if you were raised on fillet mignon without ever eating 75% fat free ground beef.

When you start at the bottom and try all ranges you can eventually appreciate what makes one thing better than another, and you have a full diverse range of taste.

Get back to the basics, drink some of the crappiest vodkas, rums, and whiskeys you can buy. Get the plastic bottles. Drink crappy beer for a while, work up to generic beer, and then drink fine beer. But it has to be over the course of a few months. First month or two drink Schlitz's, Milwaukee's best and keystone. Then the month after drink bud light, coors, and miller. Then step up to some nice IPA's and full flavor beers.

You make me sick.

Try methylated spirits.

If that don't blind you then you can move up to lemon essence.

Work it right and you should be able to get some government funding as a lab rat.

Then you future will be assured.

If you don't like drinking vodka and cranberry, why don't you just try a range of other drinks and see which one you like best? We can't really predict your tastes. Just try some drinks which are commonly served at bars. Maybe try a lighter beer as well as you may like that.

So you are a girly drinker, and you're considering going to straight to Irish Whiskey? Well that would make you manlier. Some people might tell you that worrying about how manly your drink is makes you less manly anyways. But I say it's good that you want to expand your horizons a little and develop your palet so you don't look like such a bitch at the bar.

My advice: Just go hard. Order yourself a glass of Jameson, straight. You might have a hard time with it at first, but if you've got any Irish in you...well, there's no way you have any Irish in you if you're drinking cranberry vodkas in public. Personally, I enjoy Johnny Walker Black Label (Scotch) on ice.

Another suggestion. Try Jaegermeister. That's a manly drink and it actually tastes pretty good. Actually, it's goddamned delicious, in my opinion. Get it with coke, or order yourself a JaegerBomb (Jaeger and Red Bull). Tastes pretty good with sugar free Coke/RedBull also, if you want to cut down the sugar.

Movie characters will often share scotch during an important conversation. This fits the drink, since straight scotch or whisky should be sipped. So Friday night grab a friend or two, grab a bottle of scotch, and pour yourself 1/3 of a rocks glass of booze. Add a few ice cubes.

Now just hang out with your buddies and shoot the shit for 30-40 minutes while you have 2 or 3 drinks. If it'll help, try to appreciate the oaky flavor in the scotch. You won't like it at first, but just keep sipping. Once you get a decent buzz you're done with your training for the day and you can go drink whatever you want for the rest of the night.

Do this every Friday night for two months. Switch up the brand of scotch, or whiskey, or bourbon. Try everything - Dewars, Johnny Walker Red Label, Johnny Walker Black Label, Jameson, Jim Beam, Jack Daniels, Wild Turkey, Makers Mark.

After a while you'll associate the taste with hanging out with your friends, just relaxing. Maybe play some cards or dominos, or even video games. Eventually it will go down easy.

As for beer, yes, you really need to drink more beer. If you don't enjoy light yellow mass-produced beers, I don't blame you. Bud, Coors, Miller, Corona, Busch, PBR, Keystone, Heinecken, Michelob, etc. are all crap and should only be used for drinking games.

Try something with a little color. If there's a popular local red, amber, or brown ale, give that a shot. For stouts Guinness is an OK place to start. Someone else earlier mentioned IPA's. Give those a try. I can't guarantee you'll like all of them but you should try to reach the point where you can identify what "type" of beer it is based on the taste.

A good way to try a lot of beer is to hit a beer festival. You'll probably get to sample 100 different beers. Keep track of the top 10 that you like best, and things will develop from there. I try to keep notes but I don't have a good vocabulary for it, so my notes just end up being "great!", "unexceptional", "too hoppy", and things like that.

Drinking and improving in drinking is a lot like running. Wanna get better? Do it more. Once you can put down 5 beers a day, every day, you're getting there. You'll find that you can stomach more and more different kinds of alcohol and in larger and larger quantities.

One day you'll have your epiphany. You'll know you've arrived.

For me, it came at a party for a buddy of mine. There was a toast. I found my bottle was empty. There was a bottle of Jack within arm's reach. I crushed it, f***ed your mom, then drowned myself in a river.

Only if Halfrek agrees! And D'Hofryn says okay.

I would go with Johnny Walker on the rocks. Most bars will have at least Black Label. If you stagger into a decent pub they will have Green Label. It cost a little more money a glass, but it is worth it.

You will be safe with most 12 years

Jack Daniels is so popular and trendy that anytime anyone thinks of whisky they think of "Jack." This is mostly annoying but I don't mind the stuff and wouldn't let others determine what I'm going to drink.

With that said, Evans Williams is bar far a greater value than Jack Daniels and I really only buy JD to have for when people want a "jack and coke," from the stock.

To the original poster, take the advice from a few other posters and drink cheap stuff, drink a wide range of stuff, or drink more beer, but most importantly don't act like your on your period.

Stackhouse wrote:

I would go with Johnny Walker on the rocks. Most bars will have at least Black Label. If you stagger into a decent pub they will have Green Label. It cost a little more money a glass, but it is worth it.

You will be safe with most 12 years

Yep. Johnny Walker is where it's at for an everyday sorta scotch blend. Go for JW Gold or Green Label if you're celebrating something. Blue Label if you're celebrating something, and you also happen to have a fat wallet.

redmeansdead wrote:

Stackhouse wrote:

I would go with Johnny Walker on the rocks. Most bars will have at least Black Label. If you stagger into a decent pub they will have Green Label. It cost a little more money a glass, but it is worth it.

You will be safe with most 12 years

Yep. Johnny Walker is where it's at for an everyday sorta scotch blend. Go for JW Gold or Green Label if you're celebrating something. Blue Label if you're celebrating something, and you also happen to have a fat wallet.

Are you morons talking about JOHNNIE Walker?

I'd think if you drink it as often as you claim you'd know how it's f***ing spelled.

what is the official JW label color order?

Red's cheap right? Other than that I really don't drink the stuff.

Once I was asked to bring a bottle of Pinch to a party, and I bought a very nice 15 year old bottle...set me back about $195. I didn't really know what the cashier said until I got to the parking lot. When I got to my friends house they made fun of me for not getting the 12 year old cheaper bottle which I think was somewhere near $60-70. WHOOOPS, oh well. It tasted amazing.

fall down drunk wrote:

I'd think if you drink it as often as you claim you'd know how it's f***ing spelled.

They don't own a bottle they ask a barman and HE READS THE LABEL for them. No need to know stuff in the internet age just how to get stuff presented to you pre-read.

I think it's Red, Black, Green, Gold, Blue. Green and Gold are the ones I'm not sure of.

To the OP; learn to appreciate the taste/qualities of an alcoholic beverage without any mixers. If you just wanna get buzzed, then do it your way, but you'll have a better idea of what you're doing, and you won't feel so insecure, if you can drink it straight. Ice cubes are allowed. Vodka should be served at freezing, and most whiskey/whisky/scotch at room temperature.

Johnny. Johnnie. Who gives a f***? I do own a bottle right now actually. The misspelling was a simple, irrelevant mistake.

Guinness....just make sure it's ice freaking cold.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/ce/GuinnessBeer.jpg/180px-GuinnessBeer.jpg

While we're at it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_car_bomb

Also, if you fail at this attempt to become a "manlier drinker", then just switch to wine. Good luck finding a Reisling at a bar though. When you grow up and start drinking wine let me know.

Alan

I can't believe I spelt it wrong, how dare I.

The order is:

Red, Black, Green, Gold, Blue

There are also a number of limited editions. The only one I've had is the Quest which is pretty good, but not as good as Blue, so not worth it since it cost about twice as much.