New Shots on the Block

Drinks that liven up parties nowadays have names hard to get your tongue around. Try slurring over absinthe and Jäger bombs, for a start

If you can’t say ‘absinthe’ or ‘Jägermeister’ properly, do not fret. When shots of these are passed around at parties, nightclubs or casual gatherings, what matters most is your non-verbal response—an expression of delight would do very nicely, thank you, especially if you are upwardly mobile and in your 20s or 30s; if it’s hot and it’s new, your gullet is game. Or so goes the stereotype.

Suketu Talekar, co-founder of Doollaly, a microbrewery in Pune, has of late noticed friends bringing back bottles of unheard-of alcohol from their trips abroad instead of the usual gadgets and chocolates. For some reason, those in the age bracket of 25 to 34 are doing it the most. “Just a week ago,” says Suketu, “a friend returned from Seattle with bottles of absinthe and Jägermeister. He SMSed us to meet up at my brewery that night and do Jäger shots. And we did.”

Shots and social gatherings go together. “When you make something into a shot, game mechanics come into it. People can challenge each other, introduce rules or share a bottle.” He says Jägermeister, a German herbal liqueur, became a campus rage in the US only after it positioned itself as a shot instead of a cocktail ingredient. Taste, it seems, is just one factor in a drink’s success. The stories around it often count for plenty more.

In September 2010, V Krishnakumar bought a bottle of absinthe—of which there are several brands—for his friend as a birthday gift. He bought it off the shelf from a wine shop in Mumbai, and didn’t mind paying almost double the price he would’ve at a Duty Free shop. The first time he drank absinthe was five years ago, when someone bought it for him from the London Duty Free. Half the fun in having it was the aura around the Green Fairy, as it’s popularly known. A green fluid with apparently hallucinogenic properties, absinthe can contain up to 80 per cent alcohol, and was patronised by writers and artists like Oscar Wilde, Vincent van Gogh and Ernest Hemingway  till it was banned by governments. The ban was lifted in many European countries in the 1990s, and the drink has been making its way into the Indian market for the past two years or so. The aura aside, “absinthe is an acquired taste”, says Krishnakumar.  “It tastes like saunf (fennel), and you’re not used to tasting saunf in your alcohol.”

Absinthe is “happy alcohol” in the description of a friend of Krishnakumar, who helped him finish the bottle that night. An ardent drinker, he associates it with gatherings of friends and great times. “Drinking absinthe takes you back to the first time you started drinking. You always land up doing crazy things,” he says, adding that when he worked at a television company, it was a tradition for every colleague who went abroad to return with a bottle of absinthe for the office. They would quaff it down in a vacant meeting room.

On that night, though, Krishnakumar and his friends ended up climbing a water tank and discussing children’s fiction. Absinthe is generally followed by hazy memories, he warns.

Most Indians drink to get high, and this affects the fate of exotic liquors like Sambuca, an Italian liqueur that complements the cuisine. However, Ketan Kadam, who runs 212, a newly opened Italian bar and restaurant in Mumbai’s Worli area, says he hasn’t sold a single bottle in the past six months at 212. This is because Sambuca is better enjoyed as shots at nightclubs.

And then there are other exotic drinks too. Rahul Dev, a businessman who lives in Daman, a hub of alcohol tourism, always brings back bottles of the local liquor from any foreign country he visits. His collection includes a whole range of single malts, grappas (Italian liqueurs), Becherovka (Czech liqueur), absinthe and various kinds of wine. “Grappa is generally taken after meals. But for an Indian who has whisky before meals, it makes no difference,” he says. “It can also work like Tequila as a shot.” On his most recent trip to Switzerland, he returned with a bottle of absinthe and El Nonino, his favourite brand of grappa. The absinthe bottle was consumed in just two evenings by his group of friends—males in the 40–60 age group. Unlike most 20-year-olds in Mumbai, they had it with a cube of ice in the glass, which is at least halfway closer to the tradition of having it with cold water poured over a cube of sugar. While Rahul’s friends are always open to new forms of alcohol, they find themselves reverting soon to the usual whisky, beer and wine. Rahul’s not complaining. “This way, I have most of it to myself.” He is now eager to try the pure form of Tequila.

Although Jägermeister officially started selling in India in 2009, its shots took about a year to become a rage, thanks in part to the Hollywood film Hangover. Nikhil Hemrajani knew the liquor was extremely popular at American universities, but was tempted to try it out only after watching the film. The 28-year-old also found his friends getting Jäger bombs—shots of the liquor in a glass of Red Bull, the energy drink.

Until he became a father a few months ago, Valmik B was known among his friends for the Jägermeister parties he threw. “In our parties, we make sure no one escapes the wrath of Jäger,” he says with a laugh. The key to enjoying long drunken nights without a hangover is simple, in Valmik’s opinion. “Have only Jäger shots through the night. Have them every half hour. Don’t mix it with anything else.”

Besides shots, there are also new avatars of beer to sample and savour. Although popular in the West, microbreweries that make small quantities of their own beer are still to catch on in India. In fact, most states don’t even recognise it as a legitimate business yet. When Karan Aggarwal visited Doolally in Pune, he was surprised by the beer gushing forth. It seemed authentic, for a change. “I’m no beer fan, but I really enjoyed the beer at Doolally. It was like tasting freshly squeezed orange juice after being fed on canned juice your entire life.”

He is now something of a beer connoisseur who can pick blindfolded his lager (say, Kingfisher) from his ale (Fullers) and stout (Guinness) . When he buys beer, he doesn’t look only for a certain brand anymore, but also a mark of style.

Rishabh Mariwalla, another beer connoisseur, was surprised to find the German beer Schneider-weisse at a wine shop in Khandala. He’s also found the Japanese Sapporo and Chinese Tsingtao in five-star hotels and the imported beer section of Godrej Nature’s Basket. Imported beer costs several times more than domestic brews. But that doesn’t stop those in search of variety. Or game for a round of ‘power hour’, to play which you must have a beer shot every minute for 60 minutes. “When we played with regular Indian beer, we’d feel bloated and belch after half an hour,” says Nikhil. “In another session with an imported beer like Stella Artois, the difference was stark—almost black and white.” In fact, he nearly completed his power hour. The feeling, he says, was “divine”.

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