Welcome back to Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast, your weekly dose of alcohol esoterica. We're going deep on the esoterica this week with the stupid drink invented in Finland just for a winter games in 1952. Summer games. Oh, summer games. Why do we have the summer games in Finland? What the hell? You guys, this whole time you've been talking about this, I'm like, when the hell are the Olympics in Finland? This is from 1952? Where did they just get the Beatles? All right, so we're talking about this cocktail today called The Long Drink. It's really just gin and grapefruit soda. We'll get to that though. I'm Pat from the spirits department here at Binny's. I'm Chris from Wine. Roger, Beer, Cider, Other, and in this case, Long Drinks. Long Drinks. Gregg, communications at Binny's. Jim, producer. Producer Jim's in the house. That's how you know it's good. Greg had admonished me for calling myself the executive producer last week. Yeah. Yeah. He was like, any feedback? And I was like, executive? Yeah, of course he is. You do too much to be an executive producer though. Executive producers just put their name on. Guys, we're going to talk about Long Drink today. This is something I hadn't heard of until last year. You may recall The Long Drink from such episodes as Buyers Picks 2021, Volume 1, in which the spirits buyer Jeff said, kind of had this as an aside at the end. He said, oh yeah, by the way, this Long Drink's been a real surprise for us this year. It's this canned cocktail and it's just been lighting the world on fire, which I can confirm we are selling a ton of this stuff kind of out of nowhere. Raj, we have a second one now that's coming from a beer guy, right? Yeah. Boston Beer Company. Never want to just make beer. Yeah, exactly. Beer is probably at the bottom of their priorities right now. They'd be defunct by now if they just made beer. To their credit, Boston Beer has always been looking for that other segment, and they're the creative minds behind Truly, Seltzer's, Angry Orchard, Hard Cider, when hard soda was a minute, they had hard sodas through Coney Island. How could you leave out Twisted Tea? Yeah, and then obviously Twisted Tea. And Boston Lager. When I read the press release on this, I think my brain broke for a minute. I'm like, the drink is called a long drink? I'm like, as in that whole category of drinks, like a Collins that you'd essentially like, yeah. We've talked about high balls in the past. We've talked about Tom Collins. Like essentially any drink that you'd be serving in a tall glass, typically like a Collins glass, you could call a long drink, meaning that it's not all spirits or mostly spirits. It's got a good amount of mixer in there, so it's something that isn't going to get you annihilated right away, depending on how quickly you drink it. But I think you could even argue that my last episode that I forced everyone to do, the ranch water, that's a long drink as well. So anyway, the Finns, to their credit, had only been able to drink alcohol because of a national prohibition for about 20 years. Another foolish country. Yeah, this is what you get. They were scrambling at the last minute. The Summer Games were coming to Helsinki, northernmost hosting of the Summer Games ever. They were worried that there's going to be this massive influx of tourists all at once coming to see the games and that the bars would be overrun. And they needed something that was easy to make. So, in the spirit of, you know, Brof never really wanting to make cocktails that are too complicated, it doesn't get much easier than this. This is a two-ingredient, two-step cocktail. Over the years, there's been some rifts on it. Of course, since it's so simple, people have added their own little, you know, touches on it. But at its simplest, a Finnish Long Drink is a mixture of gin and grapefruit soda. Thanks for listening to another episode of Barrel to Bottle, the Binny's Podcast. Hey, no, you can also add lemon juice. Yeah, you can add lemon juice, you can add lime juice, you can add cranberry juice. I think cranberry is the most common kind of like riff on it. To get a baseline, I think what we should do is make some from scratch, and then we can talk about the Long Drink Company, which was the first people to make a prepackaged one, and Bevy, who has just hit the market, and that's the Boston Beer Okay, wait, point of order. You wanna start with what's good, and then we're gonna taste these flavorless sodas? A, I think you're gonna be surprised that these are pretty good quality. So, I mean, it's not like- I agree with that. I've had about three of them. You know, this is like, Finland's like, oh my god, guests are coming. We have to have a cocktail. Right. You know, run out to the store. But nobody was like rum and coke. Am I wrong in believing that The Long Drink like precedes all of these seltzers and stuff as a prepackaged cocktail? It has been prepackaged in Finland for quite some time. Yeah, like since the 50s. You have to get it on draft at like most bars and restaurants. So that is a good point. Yeah. It was an RTD before they were really much of a thing. I mean, good point. You know, those innovative Finns. You can never count them out. Let's not start disparaging the Finns before we dive into the next segment. They're great hockey goalies. They're a lot of NHL goalies that are Finnish. Yeah. Let's talk about the nice things that they do, like really long days. Yeah. They're prime minister. Man, Penguins love The Long Drink. Are we going to make them first or are we going to drink the rest? This is way off the rails. I think we should make them first. Okay. Roger, we're taking your lead. What do you got? You can use any gin obviously, but I was asking Brof, don't we have a Finnish gin? I thought that would be appropriate. We are going to use cairo gin as the mixer here. In typical Northern European fashion, it's distilled from rye, because that's what they can actually grow up there. It is 46.3% alcohol. It has some pretty interesting botanicals in it. It actually uses quite a few. It uses four locally foraged botanicals and then 13 traditional ones. If you just want to try the gin on its own, which I just did, I think it is a very interesting gin. You definitely can't taste the rye. Actually, there's 19 different botanicals in there, Roger, according to the label. It is a punchy gin, punchy, and citrusy. It's macerated and it's vapor-infused and it's distillation vapor through some of these things. So blend of botanicals all put together in different ways. Pretty cool. That's interesting. Despite all of the local botanicals, they still have managed to keep the juniper up top. Yeah. And so citrus on the palate and on the nose, and there's a lot of cracked pepper on the finish as it dries out. This is a serviceable gin. It's nice. It's got a bit of a hot finish, but it's a nice gin. A little spicy. Yeah. A little spicy. Yeah, it's actually pretty good. The Greg of gins, if you will. This hit on the scene out of nowhere because it was voted the best gin for gin and tonics by somebody. So they went from not having anyone know about them to everybody wanted their gin out of nowhere. Listen to this horse on the back of the label. Have you shared a 3 AM sunrise in a misty Finnish meadow, picked berries barefoot after a sauna, or run through a rye field with your friends? We have, and we distilled those moments into our cairo gin. Is that how you say sauna normally, Pat? Sauna? Or is there a special umlaut on that spelling? No, no. When I'm talking about Finland or Finnish things, I say sauna. Sauna, of course. Oh, man. When you think of grapefruit soda, I think squirt is probably the most ubiquitous example. Maybe Fresca, but I can't stand Fresca, so we're going to go with squirt. Fresca is outstanding. Roger, you don't like Fresca? Yeah, come on. I feel like I just learned something disappointing. Fresca is lemon lime, isn't it? Is Fresca grapefruit? Yeah, it's like grapefruit, you know what I'm saying? You're thinking a 50-50, Pat, from the Canfield's company. It has aspartame in it. It just tastes like poison. I can't stand artificial sweeteners. So, Roger, you're saying that we're making a squirt, long drink right now? Yes. So I would suggest you make two and just try them side by side, because they're always saying that if you're going to use mixers, you should upgrade and have a butter mixer. So cue the fever tree commercial segment of Binny's Barrel to Bottle. So, Roger, what do you think? Like one part gin, three parts mixer, probably four parts mixer, maybe? Three to four. I think either one of those depending. I mean, with drinks as simple as I always say, it's completely adjusted to your liking. So if you want it stronger, Greg, you can make it stronger, or if you want it lighter, you can add more. I could, but Pat only gave us this tiny little sample bottle, and we have to split it into four different Long Drinks. So they're very short, Long Drinks. Oh, yeah. Sorry. Yeah. Ba-doom-ching. Okay. So we have them. I mean, honestly, we're like 12 minutes into this podcast, and this is a two-ingredient cocktail with grapefruit soda. Yes. Sorry. This is the one where I just get grumpy about this. As I was during the- The one? No, during- What was it about? You already talked about it. What was it? The ranch water. The ranch water pissed me off too, and here we are. Here we are. So again, what I hear the most from everyone that I've ever talked to in life about making cocktails is that they don't like having to have a lot of ingredients and they don't like a lot of steps. So I think you will be pleasantly surprised at how good this cocktail is for literally being the equivalent of a Jack and Coke, a rum and Coke. Yeah. It has a stupid name, The Long Drink, or how are we guessing you pronounce it in Finnish? Lonkero, L-O-N-K-E-R-O is its actual Finnish name. Who knows? Okay. Which apparently is also the word for it. It translates to long drink, but it also is the word they use for tentacles. So if you want to say that you're drinking a tentacle, go for it. Seriously? Hey, so big shock. The Fever Tree one's better. Let's move on. Are you serious? I don't know if I agree with that. I don't like the squirt one either. Well, so here's the thing. I think that the Fever Tree, I think I blended it about the same, and I think the Fever Tree is lifted more, but I also think that the gin pops a little bit more and not in the greatest of ways. Whereas I think the sweetener in the squirt, is it sugar or is it something? High fructose corn syrup. So the high fructose corn syrup in the squirt kind of tamps down the gin and gives you a more rounded experience. Now watch this. Oh, three ingredient cocktail now. Yeah. He's a mad man. This is where you can get wild with it. I mixed the two together and it's about the same. Growing up in the Chicago area, squirt is a major beverage alongside RC and 50-50. So it's got a special place in my heart. The squirt one is too sweet. Yeah. I like the more natural, juicy, acidity tartness of the Fever Tree one. I agree with that. I would think a gin that isn't rye and isn't quite as botanical heavy, honestly, I would use a more modern American style gin when making this instead of the spinach. Around citric gin, around one of those orange heavy gins. Yeah, exactly. It would be so good. Also, this needs a squirt of, this needs a squeeze of lime juice, I think, but maybe that's just because I was drinking my Palomas like that. Chris has his lemon in the holster. I'm ready to go, that makes sense. Roger's cranberry simple syrup, maybe. Yeah. I anticipated this with the squirt. I was thinking it might need a little extra citrus. The squirt comes off to me a little on the sweet side, but I'd find the nose very appealing. It's very brisk and fresh and light in citrusy, and then you get some of those botanical aromatics coming through. The fever tree, the grapefruit smell is so much more prominent and speaks so much more of oils from grapefruit skin with that kind of bitterness. You get some of that grapefruit bitterness in the cocktail too. Yeah. So, I mean, honestly, made exactly the same way. These are radically different end results. They are. I agree. And they're both good in their own way. I also want to point out that a lot of people right now, the first time this is airing is going to be around the beginning of the year, where a trend right now is better for you cocktails, low calorie. The squirt is 140 calories in a 12 ounce can. The fever tree is a 6.8 ounce bottle, but it's only 30 calories. So let's double that and say 60 for comparable ounces. That's still half the sugar of squirt. So something to keep in mind as far as, this is a very low calorie cocktail if you use the fever tree. Okay. Real quick question. Just because we're totally into authenticity here, do we know what grapefruit soda was available in Finland in 1952? The majority of this was literally as Chris pointed out, it was like everything was government controlled. So the alcohol industry is government controlled and they mostly made this as a pre-mixed beverage. So I don't think they were using like... In about 15 more years, the couple of mixologists who are primed for authenticity such as yourselves, are going to use the word like, well, actually, if you want an authentic long drink, you have to get either the Finnish pre-mixed grapefruit soda or House Alpens imports a Finnish grapefruit soda, which is really toned to recreate the original 1952 grapefruit soda. My buddy Jake Parrott can get us some. That is likely to happen. But Jim won't use it. No. Yeah, he'll use the other red. I'll use squirt. One thing that's worth mentioning is that squirt has literally been around since 1938. So it predates his cocktail. So they could have actually used something that did taste pretty similar to squirt. There's some food for that. squirt is very popular in Palomas. The addition of a little fresh lemon juice brings the squirt version into a little more focus. I believe it. And I think it improves it. So a little fresh citrus isn't a bad thing to have around. I was a little disappointed that Chris didn't have his own homemade grapefruit soda. For sure. So obviously, if you wanted to deconstruct this further, get the air Horn ready, Jim. You could use your own simple syrup, fresh grapefruit juice and seltzer water and bam, probably going to have the best tasting thing if you were to do it that way. A little bit of spice drink. Yeah. Either simple syrup or cranberry simple syrup. Yeah. I think the cranberry simple syrup, which you can find the recipe on our blog, that would be perfect here because as I mentioned earlier, cranberry is definitely a common addition in Finland to The Long Drink. Or how about some Swedish lingonberries? That would be nice. I had this conversation with some friends right around the time that Ranchwater was in the scene, and they were pretty attuned to this, too, even though they're not in the alcohol industry. And they were like, we had some Ranchwater, and it was really good. And I was like, well, what brand of Ranchwater? And they were like, Ranchwater brand Ranchwater. And I was like, no, it's not. There's a different brand on there somewhere. And they're like, I'm pretty sure it was just big on the can. Ranchwater, Ranchwater. I'm looking at these cans of Long Drink. They're Long Drink Long Drink. It's a perfect analogy, Greg. Astute observation. It was on first routine here. It's super confusing and dumb. How are people supposed to know what is going on? They're all just like Long Drink. And then even one, the one with the big other brand name still says Long Drink is the second largest font on the can. Got some nice Northern Lights imagery on there, on the bevy can. So confusing. Oh, yeah, that's what that's supposed to be, huh? I don't think so. Oh, I think because the Finnish Long Drink, I guess is their full name or the Long Drink Company is the full name of the company, decided to just name themselves after the drink itself, yes. So this is the Long Drink Company, the Finnish Long Drink, Long Drink. Yes. Of Utica, New York. Hat on a hat. Even the original Long Drink was made by a company called Heartwell, right? So they weren't even going so far as to grab that name. It says the Finnish Long Drink, but it's from Utica. Yeah, it's not Albany, but Utica. This is infuriating. Oh, I'm... Well, it's more of an Albany expression. It's Finland by way of Albany. Once again, on my deathbed, I'm going to be like steamed hams. So the Finnish one, which were the Baby Blue Peacock Blue Can, is the traditional citrus Long Drink. Let's try that first. Okay, thank you. As opposed to the white one with Baby Blue Font, which is what? Oh, the zero sugar. That's a low calorie now. Zero sugar. So are we Finnish with the whole cocktail discussion? Jim. Jim, you're not invited back. Look, it's been a long time since I've been on an episode. That would be so Swede if we were finished. But Norway. Stop it. Denmark. Regular Long Drink, surprisingly solid. I've tried a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot of crappy canned cocktails the last three years. This is definitely one of the better ones. It tastes like squirt, but not quite as sweet and heavy on the palate. There's some gin and juniper flavor there. It says that it's flavored with grapefruit and juniper berry. So my guess is they have a pretty neutral gin, and then they just have carbonated water, and they just have a grapefruit syrup and a juniper syrup that go into it. But the result is pretty light and crisp and refreshing. I get why people would drink this on a hot, finished summer's day. Yeah, all day long. Of a balmy 52 degrees Fahrenheit. Okay. Pat, your description is succinct and effective. Important distinction here. It says gin with natural grapefruit, but the flavor description is like the flavor type of this is traditional citrus, and I get a lot more lemon lime than I do grapefruit off of this. Yeah, it's in there. I think it's pretty clearly grapefruit. Yeah, I would definitely. For somebody whose nickname isn't the Fruit King, they're going to open this can and be like, oh, that's great. Yeah, I agree. You're going to open it and be like, where's the jackfruit? No, this tastes more like 7Up than it does squirt. Disagreed. I think you would blind, and you would guess Fresca or squirt. I disagree. We're going to have to blind The Long Drink 7Up and squirt. Chris, Jim? I'm kind of with Roger. Am I crazy? I think it's kind of more of a lemon limey kind of thing. Because the squirt tastes like grapefruit with like, like when you cut open a grapefruit and you put sugar on it, because it's too bitter because you're a kid who doesn't want bitter grapefruit. Is there a different way to eat grapefruit? Well, no. Without the sugar like a grown-up. Without the sugar like an adult. I still eat grapefruit that way, and that's what squirt tastes like to me, where this tastes more like a lemon lime. It's flatter and it's more dialed back, but it has, I think, more grapefruit. The definitive answer is. Yes, let's hear Chris's. Chris is the tiebreaker here. I personally find clear grapefruit in the nose. Yeah. It smells of grapefruit, but on the palate, I have to go with the other side. It's more of a clean lemon lime. You can't play both sides that way. He just did. That just happened. We're trying to play our friends against each other here. What are you doing? No, I agree with Chris. I agree with Chris. I do so much more of my tasting on the nose. No, Chris is totally right. He's totally right. On the palate, it's 7-Up, and on the nose, it's squirtle. I didn't pour it out of the can, so I suppose I didn't smell it. I'm just literally just drinking this out of the can. Yeah, I agree with what Chris said too. I got to imagine that most people are going to do exactly that. The proportion of people who are going to take time to pour this on the rocks may be minimal. I don't know. Yeah. OK, well. But I think you should. I think a lot of people are, yeah, just crushing this out of the can. But there is some professional golfer connected to this in some way, shape or form. So I think they're targeting like throw these in the golf bag on a hot summer's day instead of light beer. That's going to suck when it gets a little warmer. I don't know. I don't see this tasting good unless it's ice cold or something. Arnold's Pomplamoose. Yeah, that was good. Chris is on today. All right. So this stuff comes in a six pack can. It's $11.99, a six pack. And the ABV is 5.5. 5.5, yeah. All right, do you want to try the Zero Sugar next? Yeah, so for the point of- Side by side, it's just like taste in Dark Lord Vintages. One drink side by side. Not to burst some bubbles here, but I know a lot of seltzer drinkers are liking these. They're RTDs, not seltzers, so this has 180 calories and 18 grams of carbs. Holy cow. Is that all? Holy cow. That'll do it. Well, that makes sense why they have this sugar-free version because the sugar-free proudly proclaims 99 calories, which is not bad. That's light beer. Yeah, and zero carbs, zero added sugar. Right. That's alcohol calories. It also says gluten-free, just like a box of M&M's or a corn chip. Yeah. Keto-friendly is on there as well. Did I ever show you that picture? I took it at the local Jewel Oscar one day that had a big sign on their seafood counter that said our entire seafood selection is gluten-free. Now, ironically, am I crazy or does this taste sweeter than the regular one? It is because it's sweet. Aspartame, baby. Because I was actually surprised at how crisp and dry the original one was, but they've definitely amped up the sweetness. I think this one smells less sweet. It smells less heavy, but on the palate, it's pretty sucral. It's got that weighty, sugary mouthfeel to it. Yeah. Despite the fact that it's not actually sugar. That being said, though, I don't think, as Roger pointed out, Fresca has that distinctly saccharin-like flavor or whatever they use. That's very unpleasant. I don't think that your average person would be too surprised by the flavor here. I agree. It tastes sweeter, but relatively natural. It's just that it's sweeter. Yeah. Yeah. Sucralose is 600 times sweeter than sugar. So you're getting a sweeter impression, but it doesn't have that chemical bitterness that I get from aspartame. Well, I'm 600 times sweeter than Greg, and I have no chemical aftertaste either. It only takes a little bit of Chris to equal with Greg. So let me tell you something, you guys. This comes with a very big warning of your mileage may vary and everybody's tastes are different, but this stinks. The whole category or just this one? The sugar-free one especially. I don't know why. It just tastes like flat pop that I don't want to drink. Diet pop that has been left out too long. I mean, again, there are a lot of diet pop drinkers out there. So if you are one, I think you'll like this. Big caveat. But I don't ever drink that. Big caveat, your mileage may vary. Not for Greg. Yeah, we're probably not the best group to be assessing diet sodas. So I don't get into that either. All right. So anyway, I think the end takeaway here is that nothing's free. So if you want these zero calorie, the zero carb, you have to not mind or enjoy sucralose. So if you do, you might love this. I don't mind it at all. I don't get Greg's hate. I think it's fine. The high calorie version is obviously better, but this light one's fine. And there's three more cans in my house that I'm going to drink. All right, so we've established that that one was not for Greg. Let's get to the one that was designed for Greg. Open the black can. Thank you. Oh, the high octane one? The complaint that I have about both so far is that there's not enough gin. Where is the gin? It's just like an alcoholic grapefruit soda. So this flavor, as you'll notice on the can, is just strong. This is what you drink before you go up to do your clean and jerk at the Olympics. This is the best one so far. Oh, of course, you think it's the best one so far. This is the best one so far. It's the most flavor blast. It has flavor. It tastes more like grapefruit than the first one. You're right. Not just grapefruit, but a little flash of gin, more grapefruit. This has a stronger presence. I wonder if they dialed up the grapefruit flavor to mask the alcohol. I guarantee you, you're just going to take the leftover cans home and just put them in a pine glass and add gin to them. Yeah, I mean. Pine glass. He's going to start his infinity jug of Long Drink. I think this one shows too much boozy-ness, and I find it taking away from the actual flavor of the cocktail personally. And I use cocktail generously here, obviously. Yeah, well, I think your opinion is wrong and you should feel bad. That's fine. Yeah, I think that's a bit of madness too. I don't think it's too boozy. I think it's a bit rough. I don't know. I think you're crazy. I think they up the grapefruit to mask the alcohol and that made it perfect. Yeah, it actually gives you flavor. I'm finding it interesting the way that the flavor profiles vary between these very subtly, despite, you know, ostensibly be aiming at the same thing. Because like the sweetness level for me here is somewhere in between the original and the zero calorie one. It's just slightly higher than the regular one, but it still has that nice bright citrusy note. And I don't think it's too boozy by any means. Well, in the strong one, the flavor increases, but the sweetness doesn't. Rod, you got a calorie count on this one? Yeah, you're not going to like it. It's absent from the set of the camp. This is the bad thing about anything that has higher alcohol. People kind of forget that alcohol has calories, so. Alcohol is calories. 230 calories. Yeah. Same amount of carbs though. That's kind of interesting. So like if you were to just pound eight of these on a summer day, you'd have your full caloric content. Just you're done. You're ready to pass out without eating. I'm going to do that and my wife is going to yell at me. I'm going to be like, listen, I'm trying to live a healthy lifestyle here. Yeah. You're really cramping my style. And then you're going to wake up at two in the morning and not understand why your arm itches so much. Calories in, calories out. Don't you follow that subreddit? Come on. Garbage in, garbage out. All right. So I have a question here. Do you guys feel like you're getting much Jin character in these? Because my answer would be not really, which I think is kind of weird. Yep. I mean, to me, if someone was like, no, it's just green neutral spirit. I'd be like, okay, I don't think there is enough Jin character. I think it probably, they say it's for sure this is neutral spirit that was Jin just macerated with some bit of juniper. Like some in the most, in the cheapest. How else can they make this $12 if it's actually quote unquote Jin? This was done in the cheapest way possible. So they had totally neutralized spirit, macerated in some juniper, or they had a separate tank of neutral spirit with juniper, making a bit of an extract character, blending it back into the neutral spirit, blending it with whatever flavoring syrups are going to do it. That's why it says it has juniper flavor added, probably because it was so indistinct to begin with. Then it just gets carbonated and watered down and canned up. I think that we tied the bow on that one, so let's go to cranberry country here. Cranberry, back at 5.5, it's probably about the same calories as the... Yeah, strangely, it's 160 calories, so it's 20 less than the citrus, kind of bizarre. And lower carbs, it's 15 carbs as opposed to 18, so maybe they're using... It's a less sugary syrup, the cranberry syrup versus the citrus syrup, for sure. Maybe. Well, definitely, it comes off drier. I think. Well, I agree with that, actually, a lot. Yeah, it comes off very dry. Maybe the driest of the bunch. There's no nose. Do you guys smell anything? Anything. This has the nose of a glass of water. I get like a berry candy. On the nose? The nose does not remind me of like a cranberry juice. It reminds me of like a berry candy, like a... One of those hard candies I would throw away on Halloween is what this reminds me of. What glass are you drinking out of? What the hell are you tasting? Are you smelling anything here? A rocks glass? I have a small rocks glass. I get nothing. I still get the kind of bitter grapefruit aspect out of it, but there's not much from the cranberry on the nose. However, on the palate, I do think you actually feel the cranberry astringency, the kind of tannic nature of cranberries. I agree. You can feel that on your tongue, and so it's decidedly cranberryish when you drink it. You guys, I figured it out. We didn't know that Roger was going to ask if there was enough gin flavor, so we poured this three minutes before you, and the carbonation has blown off, and much of the nose has completely dissipated to nothing in that time. It's like they took old Bartles and James and forgot to dump out the water that was in the pitcher when they were cleaning it. Do you remember old Bartles and James? The first, well, not the first time I was drunk, but the first time I was memorably really drunk was on Bartles and James, and these are so much better than Bartles and James. He was a rambunctious eight-year-old bad little pat brofie. Bartles and James were so gross. Again, I would say that we live in a seltzer dominant world right now when it comes to things that are other, and there's some real flavor here that I don't get in a lot of the seltzers. The seltzers a lot of the times are just taste this chemical flavoring in water, and this is more interesting and enjoyable to me than that. Well, Greg is just surly because by 4.15 on a Friday, he's usually already decanting his kerosene or Sterno for his nightly cocktail. He's riding it. Him and the dragon lady are about to get sh** up. Ride the dragon. I'm excited for you to try Bevy, because I think you're going to be pretty impressed. I initially, especially since we established that The Long Drink companies don't particularly deliver a big gin character, I guess the knock on Bevy would be that it's not made with gin. I think they deliver a pretty quality flavor despite not being made with gin. They've done a better job in the laboratory. Let's start with the citrus. There is nothing at all in this remotely resembling gin. I completely disagree. I would say that the juniper flavor... I'm going with Roger on this one. This has more juniper character than the ones that we made from scratch, in my opinion. I said my initial aroma tasting note just based on sniffing the can whole. Now that I've poured it into a glass, it has opened up a bit. Hashtag sniffing the can whole. The one dirty secret about these is that there's no nutritional facts anywhere. I'm thinking that they are every bit as sweet as the soda, but whatever. Yeah. Introducing, we've moved on past the Finnish Long Drink from Long Drink Company. From Utica. Now we're on to Bevy, which is not advertised on here, but this is a Boston Beer Company creation. It says right on the bottom here, does not contain distilled spirits because it is a malt beverage with natural flavors and wild juniper berries. Okay. Wild stuff. It's wild stuff. Yeah. I like this, guys. There's four times the nose. I think it was pretty good. Four times the amount of notes on the nose. Four times the intensity. I'm not saying it's good. Yeah. It's like lemon-lime sprite with bubble gum, but it is present. Yeah. It's nice. This is the first one we're trying with no actual gin in it, including the ones we made, and it has the most prominent juniper smell. The most juniper smell, and it has a more complex palate. It has a better palate, it has a better mouthfeel. This is a better, I want to say Long Drink. You nailed it, man. Look at you, Greg, completely tying a bow on this. I completely agree with everything he's said. The Long Drink Company ones are incredibly dominated by grapefruit, and this one has more going on than just the grapefruit. I will give it that. I'm actually picking up the complexities. Also, if you're looking for a buzz, this one is the highest alcohol except for the strong 5.8. It's close. But still more. It's 0.3 higher than one of the others. Yeah, that's nebulous. Still, compared to seltzers and light beer and everything else, like 5.8 is a healthy amount of alcohol. I haven't poured a single one of these over ice, but this might be the only one that would last on ice. I agree with that. These are a testament to modern food science. That's what I think, for sure. I agree. Also, because this is so uninteresting, I'm overanalyzing. I think on the very finish, you'll pick up a tiny little burst of pepper. I think they put something like chili pepper in here, too, to give it a little bit of squeeze and character. I don't know. I totally get what you're talking about. There is a little flourish of a spicy kick. It's microscopic, but it's spicy. Yeah. Yeah. We're at the stretch, we're in the finish line is In Sight, Helsinki style. Was that a pun? No, that was just an attempt to turn things back to the 1952 Summer Games. But he said finish. Yeah, and I said finish. You missed the finish line. Oh, we got it. I am picking up what you were laying down. They got it. Are we recommending these with Winter Olympic viewing this year? I think absolutely. Bevy's Sparkling Berry smells like ass. It is nose blasted for sure. I mean, it is just Smarties jumping out of the glass. This is for all the seltzer drinkers. This tastes like a smirnoff ice flavor. Kids aspirins. Kids aspirins. It tastes like a bunch of seltzers. This is brutal. I regret picking up samples of this for Roger. It tastes that bad. I don't think it's that bad. It's one dimensional sugar blasted crap. No, that's a little too harsh. That's bringing on the hate. I think that this is going to appeal to seltzer drinkers. Give me that cranberry long drink, not this sparkling berry bevy long drink. Head to head, I could see someone liking the cranberry long drink better than this, but a lot of the people interested in long drinks are people who also drink seltzers, and this level of flavor blasting, as we always like to say, this is a can, I think a lot of people are probably going to like these canned cocktails. I would rather scarf down a whole wet bucket of smooch than have to drink some of these. They're not dried smooch, they're wet smooch. Again, not for you, Greg. Like many podcast topics, this was not, they weren't sitting around a table and they were like, all right, Greg Versh is our target audience. You know what this needs? A pint of Dragon Lady. Focus group of one. What's the verdict on this cocktail? Overly simplistic, potentially overrated, but really good when you just need something simple, and these flavors are, this is a natural flavor together, a natural flavor pairing, gin and grapefruit. We saw some interesting rifts with Long Drink Company. Bevy was arguably better and more interesting. Bevy Berry though gets a vote of no confidence from me. Outside of that, simple to make on your own, low calorie option with the Fever Tree, slightly higher calorie, more producer gym centric option with the squirt. Okay, this is fine. Make it on your own and pour it with the Fever Tree. I want a better cocktail though. That's my conclusion here. Maybe we can dial up our resident mixologist, confessions of a mixologist guy. Oh yeah, I wonder what they think about this. Yes, and maybe they can make us a cocktail. That guy is a ****hole. That guy is so ****ing snooty. We're going to get this long blog post about, it's not in the Juniper tradition to do something like this. This meandering pinch on essay about kite flying. We're going to get some goofy cocktail with Dutch barrel-aged Juniper and fresh white grapefruit. You can't just go to the store and get this kind of grapefruit juice squeezed in, and then some kind of soda water with added salt. That's what we're going to get. Artisanal French sparkling spring water. I would like to say, if these companies are looking for an innovative flavor to expand on, there should be a Cloudberry Long Drink. Cloudberry is one of the most sought after fruits. They're basically only found in the wild, a Finnish tradition to enjoy them. I can't believe this didn't hit me before, but about three times a year, somebody emails spirits at binnys.com looking for a Cloudberry liqueur that's only available in Finland, of course, because why the hell would they sell it anywhere else? Yeah. And it just struck me that that person is definitely Roger, under a different email address every time. Yeah, right. That's the only reasonable explanation for that request. How are they supposed to make an industrial widely available product with this berry that only is fleetingly available in Finland? And that brings us to the Q&A portion of Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast, where we answer your question for a $20 Binny's Gift Card. Send your questions to us via email at commentsatbinnys.com or hit us up on social media at Binny's Bev on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Jim's digging for the questions. Oh, I got it, I sent it to you, you have it. Well, I'm on the thing. No, Jim can read it. Jim's technically on this episode, we've just been cutting them off for 40 minutes. I mean, it's kind of what happens. Oh, and follow us on TikTok. Yeah, oh yeah, follow us on TikTok soon. We're going to be doing some boomerang videos. Dance with Roger. And some sparkly stuff. Roger and I are doing shuffle dance tutorials. Coming soon to mine. RIP. This email comes from Mike. Binny's Barrel to Bottle team. I truly like Lorette Perrier's Grand Siècle. I believe I had the version just prior to 24, which I am presently cellaring. It is one of my favorite champagnes. What other champagnes would be similar that you would recommend I try? And a second question. What champagnes do you recommend for cellaring and for how long? I would like to try to collect some truly special champagnes for the coming decades. Damn. Thank God Chris is on the card. sir Winston Churchill QV. Oh yeah, that is the bomb. That is great. However, maybe not perfect for this gentleman. I wouldn't dissuade him from trying it because it's a classic from Paul Roger, but- House brand. A couple of points about the Grand Siècle. This is Laurent Perrier's Tête de Cuvée or Top of the Line. And unlike most, it is non-vintage, which is why this gentleman has referenced a number rather than a vintage. Why is it only 24? It seems like there should have been more than just 24 batches up until now. Well, I do believe there probably were, but they didn't always number them. At some point, when you're putting out a champagne that costs $150, you've got to make a distinction in the bottlings. The style of Laurent Perrier is very different from both Krug and Winston Churchill in that it is a reductive style that is very focused, bright, fresh, and leans on Chardonnay heavily in the blend, although it's not all Chardonnay. If you want champagnes that age exceptionally well, look for Blanc to Blanc, Chardonnay-based champagnes rather than Pinot noir or Pinot Mougnet-heavy champagnes. So you're saying like the ones with the more creamy style definitely aren't going to age as long as the ones with the more robust angular Chardonnay character. Well, that's often the case. Chardonnay brings a lot of acidity and some structure and intensity to the wine, whereas Pinot noir, it's a muscular wine, but it's not necessarily built as well for aging. It's more full-bodied and shows maybe a little better at a younger age. However, that is a broad generalization. And anything made with Mougnet is going to be quite fruit-driven, and probably the last ones I would consider aging. So, beyond all that, number one, look for Blanc to Blanc. Number two, a few absolutely great examples that you want to think about that will have a similar elegance and longevity to Laurent Perrier would be Biakar Saman, Cuvée Louise, I believe, is there Blanc to Blanc? Yes. Absolutely killer. Ruin Art, Dom Ruin Art, Blanc to Blanc, and maybe my favorite, which is Tattinger's Comp de Champagne, Blanc to Blanc, vintage dated. It's sublime. You have to try this. You can drink them on release, but you can literally drink these after decades of aging, and they're sublime. Is Grand Siac Shard Heavy or does it have a lot of other stuff too? It is shard heavy, which is why I started there. Shard heavy and also reductive in its approach, as opposed to oxidative, like say Krug or Bollinger would be very oxidative style. I was going to ask where my new beloved Bollinger falls on this spectrum. Yeah, Bollinger is very, very oxidative in its approach. Both Krug and Bollinger tend to age base wines in old oak barrels. So the base wine gets more oxygen as opposed to stainless steel tanks. Toasty and creamy. I think Bollinger might end up being 2022's hams. Just watch out, guys. Oh, wow. That's Roland Goulart. A step up there. More like a step down, Jim, but I get what you're saying. Chris, here's a follow up question. If you are interested in the flavor of vintage champagnes but don't have the patience. Vintage. Oh, vintage dated. Like the finest French champagnes. Is there any house that you would say you can kind of something about the way that they produce it, time on lease, whatever it may be, that is going to give you a vintage character for something without having laid it down? Vintage champagnes are made because the vintage is exceptional. Non-vintage champagne is actually the region's real wheelhouse. To hedge against very cold or unusual rainy hail affected vintages, the ability to blend has been essential for champagne for centuries. So that's why non-vintages is so important. I guess this is what it boils down to. Are you asking, how do you get the flavor of aged champagne without aging a vintage? Yeah. The simple answer is, feel free to age a non-vintage for three or four years, and you will start to develop tertiary aromas that are common in very, very old vintage champagnes. They just develop a little faster, so you'll get nutty, cherried, notes, coffee, all that. There you go. Mike, thanks for writing your question in. Everybody else can email their questions to comments at binnys.com, or hit us up on social media, at Binny's Bev on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. And TikTok. And TikTok. All right. So, long drink, huh? Yeah. It's a high ball, and you can make it yourself, or you can buy these cans, and that's about it. Roger, you better wrap this one. Give us the actual lesson to be learned. We're always trying to figure out what the newest trends are. We want to help demystify them, explain what's going on. So I think this was a fun look at this very strangely named finish, seemingly obscure to us Americans. But it's super popular in Finland. There's some good options out there. And again, like I said before, if you're a fan of RTDs, alternative type stuff, seltzers, these are something worth checking out. And something we didn't really talk about when we were doing this, but while we were doing the listener question, I was pouring them over ice. And that's something that I think you should consider too with these that we didn't really talk about when we were tasting them that I think can arguably improve them a bit. So, Long Drinks, we'll see if they last, but a lot of people have been drinking them and liking them. So, you have a couple options out there. Finish Long Drink Company, Bevy, or make your own. We've got millions of gins. And we have excellent grapefruit soda in fever tree pink grapefruit. Thanks for listening to another episode of Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. We'll be back in your feed next week with, I don't know, something. It don't matter. Until next time, I'm Greg. I'm Jim. I'm Pat. I'm Chris. I'm Roger. Keep tasting. Welcome back to Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. This is a 15-minute episode, because we're talking about vodka in squirt. It's gin and squirt. It's gin and squirt, you idiot. Put some respect on this cocktail's name.