The worst liquor on earth | How to Drink

A lot of people think that malort is the worst thing you can possibly drink. Those people have never had this. I promise you, malort is absolutely kid's stuff compared to this. This flavor will stay with you for days. You'll taste it in your nose. It'll permeate your sinus system. It'll just keep coming back on you. It's truly foul. I'm not saying that there are not worse spirits out there. I just don't know how to get them. There's a kind of fermented mare's milk that is drunk in Mongolia. I can't get that here in the United States. Just things that aren't imported and that maybe could not be imported legally because they're actually, on some level, unfit for human consumption. That doesn't mean you can't drink them and not die. It's just that, you know, by the numbers, you look at it and say, yeah, you can't drink this. You can't sell this to people, at the very least. So recently, I did an episode where I attempted to make decent cocktails from malort, and I did another one where I made decent cocktails from Jagermeister. I felt like I was pretty successful on both of those, but in both of those, I mentioned that at some point, I'm gonna have to do caoliang wine, which is a kind of baijiu, because it is the worst thing I've ever drank in my life, and I didn't have any caoliang wine. I couldn't figure out, where did it go? Why didn't I have it? Certainly, I never drank all of it. It's actually possible that I did use the last of it, making Sankheg's Hide from Critical Role, but I don't think so. I think what happened is I moved and I thought, well, I'll certainly never want to drink this again, and I threw it away in the process of moving. Little did I know that I'd be back here again, so I went out and I found some more caoliang wine. The thing of it is, is that I also found several other baijius, and so very soon, I will do an episode where I attempt to make good cocktails from this, but today, since I found so many baijius, I thought we should just do a taste test of these, and the reason I want to do that is because I have seen people in my comments tell me, oh God, you're drinking the worst one. You really have to try the others. Without further ado, let's get into trying out some baijiu on How to Drink Today. We'll see what these are like, and if you should put them into your home bar, maybe that's what we're figuring out today. Is there room for baijiu in your home bar? Maybe. Might be useful to talk about what baijiu is. Baijiu is a distilled spirit, usually quite high proof, that is at least somewhat sorghum-based, if not mostly sorghum-based. I've seen different percentages on different bottles. They usually break it out, so for example, this one is 50% sorghum, 50% wheat. This one is 83% sorghum and 17% wheat. Both these are, you know, this is 58% ABV, this is 53% ABV, so they're pretty high proof spirits, and I am led to believe that the more sorghum is in the mix, the more difficult to drink it will be. It's a rougher spirit, less pleasant spirit as we add sorghum to it. To the extent that's possible, I'll read off the sorghum quantities on these as I go. How do you drink baijiu? Believe it or not, I actually had a cocktail with some baijiu in it at Epcot Center recently, and if you wanna check out that video, you can click here or down there, and I didn't hate it. I was very impressed by it, but typically it's not put into cocktails. I am led to believe that it is typically served in extremely small shot glasses, like a quarter ounce pour, and sort of like amongst men trying to prove their manliness. It's not even meant to be enjoyed. I think that there are traditions of drinking it at weddings and such, but this is just what I've been led to believe by my comments. Honestly, I have not done a big deep dive on the drinking rituals of baijiu. I think I've stalled long enough. Here we go, Mu Tai Prince. I'm not sure how to pronounce that. It does come in a fairly attractive bottle, I have to confess. I actually kinda like the way that looks. It's got a product of China, imported by Diamond Hong, Incorporated Brooklyn. There's so many words on these that I can't read because they're in Chinese. I assume they're mostly warnings, like don't drink this, this is suitable for stripping engine components, not for human consumption, wouldn't feed this to a dog, that kind of stuff. That is... Even the smell of this is just enough to set your hairs on end. My God. It is deeply unpleasant stuff. And I gotta say too, I'm not even doing this episode because, oh, the internet loves it when I torture myself. I think you do sometimes. I'm doing this because I need to do this research anyway before I do the episode where I try to make cocktails from them. I'm doing this because it's my job. Oh, what does that smell? It might be distantly some anise kind of notes, anise. Maybe. It's truly... It's wet dog. It is the smell of my grandmother's giant, disgusting, uncleaned, suffering English sheepdogs. And when, oh, the wet sheepdog. Shoe leather, shoe polish. There is something that's a bit like a candy. I don't know if it's, you know, it's like my brain is chewing around the edges of it. It's definitely, might be licorice. Maybe. Something else, though. I don't know. God, I hate drinking this. I've got a glass of seltzer here that I'm keeping close at hand to rinse out my palate. I'm not trying to get sick today. Could happen. Ow! Woo! Oh, man. That is strong. Oh, God. That's the good one too. God damn, I hate this thing. ****! Ha! Ah! Okay. It just sets you on fire first off. Jesus! Man! I drink a lot of high-proof spirits. This is high-proof, but somehow it's higher-proof tasting? I don't know. Yee! Maybe I just went down a little square on that one. The first flavor note I got on that, I gotta work from memory because there's no ******* way I'm going back in for more of this. Rotting grass. Like you cut your lawn and you took your grass clippings and threw them into a hot garbage can and left it there for like a month in the sun. That is that taste. That resolves into just like, oh, what was that flavor profile note? Rotting grass into, like, maybe also notes of fresh grass clippings, which is not the least pleasant taste, but, you know, it's sandwiched between rotting grass and a lot of rotting grass, or maybe rotting hay. That smell when you're, you ever seen like, one time, there was like a construction site near me and they had hay bales or straw bales, probably, you know, to protect the construction site. And it got rained on in the summer and just the smell that came off it. Somebody once told me, oh, that's phosgene gas. That's a nerve agent. Yeah, that's kind of a part of this. Ah, it comes back. There's some kind of a very herbal rooty component there that maybe, maybe it is an anise note, but I know there's no anise in this. It's just like, you know, those chemical compounds that make flavors happen can show up in more than one place from more than one chemical process. You can arrive at those same things. So maybe that's what it is. But like one part of what makes anise taste like anise, as opposed to the 350 things that make anise taste like anise. And that's why it's like, it's like that, but it's not that. The wet dog all through it, oh, it's up in your nose. That was like a really tiny pour. And then I was really surprised. Yeah, there was like some, I often find these raisiny notes. There were some raisiny notes. It was sulfurous at various points in there. There are no redeeming qualities. Like I'm not gonna mention anything that was pleasant about this experience of drinking Motai Prince, except for maybe the raisins, but like they're sandwiched between rot and wet dog. Like it's not good. It's a whole, it's a singularly unpleasant experience. It's bad from start to finish. And the best part is it keeps coming on you. It just keeps coming back. You just, oh, I smell it again. It's in my nose. It's in my throat. Oh my God. Got four more to go. Jesus. Let's go with the one that has the prettiest label. Ming River Sichuan Baizhou. Distilled from grain, original journey. So the reason I'm interested in this one is because this one is very clearly branded for an American palate, right? Like whatever's going on in here, this is the Baizhou we're gonna sell to people who are not accustomed to that flavor, that Baizhou flavor. Original journey up river into the heart of Sichuan. Where does it, it's 45%. So it's a slightly slower proof, slower, slightly lower proof. This one does not, oh, Ming River uses only the finest sorghum grain and purest water. Traditional pot stills placed in a ceramic, in ceramic for a clean finish. Yeah, so I don't know. Maybe this one will actually be interesting. Maybe it'll have sort of a bouquet that can be appreciated in a really kind of intellectual way not like on an instinctual level, like where it's like, that's nice, but like, oh, I see what's happening in there. Like looking at modern art, like, oh, that's interesting. That kind of a thing. Maybe that's what it'll be like. While I'm stalling before I put this to my lips, let me just say that How to Drink is brought to you by viewers like you who have chosen to support How to Drink through my Patreon. You're gonna find a link to my Patreon down here in the pinned comment or up here in the corner where the little eyeball, the eye dot thingy is. And over on my Patreon, you will get access to our private Discord server where I'm in there and you're in there and we're talking about the show and discussing future episodes and I'm bouncing ideas off of you and I'm complaining and I'm sharing the analytics that make the show possible. You're gonna get behind the scenes videos. You're gonna get exclusive episode type content. You're gonna get these episodes without advertisements. Sometimes there are bonus cocktails that are Patreon exclusive. All of that stuff and more and more to come. And if you just take a look, thank you for even considering it. And if you choose to support the show or you've been supporting the show for a while, thank you so much. You make all of this possible. All of this possible. All of this drinking of Baizhou is possible through the support of viewers like you. I think I'm allergic. I think I'm allergic to Baizhou. Okay, here we go. Szechuan Baizhou. Ah, way too much. It's not anise, but ah, that is not peach either. But it's in the vein of both of them somehow. What is that? Oh man, that's weird smelling. Peach anise. Anise of peach. Here we, here's, here's mud in my eye. Ah. Ugh. Okay. Ooh, yeah. It's definitely better than the Moutai Prince. This is definitely toned down for a Western mouth. It's kind of spicy. It's got like almost a spicy kind of, not chili pepper, but like a spicy, tangy kind of thing that goes right into wet dog, baby. Right up into that wet dog, that decay, that funky monkey. And then it takes on a second dimension of wet dog and rot that just like you exhale it. It comes out of your nose as you sip this. And it stays with me. It has a distant note of horse manure. I'm suddenly reminded of walking around in Central Park in the vicinity of where the horse-drawn carriages are and they leave their plops distantly. There is a note there that it's on the tip of my brain and I can't figure it out. It's not, is it celery? It's something green. It's celery-ish. It's anise-ish. It's not a million miles away from peach. It could be like a bit of almost fennel. It's somewhere in that blob of flavors. I can't quite put my finger on it. I wish I could, because I feel like this would be much more informative. I'll try this one again. I'll give her another sip. There's something in there that it tastes like a thing that I've smelled around cheaper aquariums, like roadside aquariums. There's some kind of like aquarium cleaner taste in that. I don't know what you're supposed to do with this. I don't know how I'm going to make a decent cocktail out of any of these Baizhou's. This one says 1680. I don't think Baizhou goes back that far, but I don't know. I'm certainly claiming it does. This is Red Star Ergotoujou. I apologize. E-R-G-U-O-T-O-U-J-I-U. Three separate things. 53% alcohol by volume. Distilled from sorghum. Oh, good Lord. Is this 100% sorghum? I can't read any of this, so I don't know. All I know is I didn't see wheat on there. I think the eight is good luck in Chinese numerology. I hope so. I don't know if that's like a warning or solace, like good luck, or this brings good luck. Okay, Red Star. Red Star. I genuinely don't think this is a taste I could ever acquire. I don't think that there's any amount of Baizhou that I could drink where I would finally be like, kind of like it. Don't think so. Yeah, same wet dog nose. Same wet dog channel. Same wet dog place. Oh, that's hot. It might be the least unpleasant of them so far, where I'm just starting to acquire this taste that I'm not supposed to acquire. There is a beat of the raisin at the end there. It was also really tiny sip, like it barely kissed my lips. I might, you know. That might be the least wet dog tasting. Whoa, it's got a weird aftertaste, man. Those things come back. Yeah, I like, ooh, that's a strange taste there too. All right, raisins. Don't know why. I don't know why. That's just always, when there's even a little bit of a raisiny kind of chemical that gets so loud to me. Copper. Has some copper kind of notes in there. It has maybe the taste of my mom opening a pack of Virginia Slim cigarettes when I was a kid. What is that last thing that like comes back at you? So, oh, is that what it is? Oh, it makes everything sting inside of your lungs. It's like eating bees. You know what that is? Yeah, I think that's it. I live in New Jersey and growing up, we used to, you know, you drive up the turnpike past the oil refineries and stuff. It's actually, it's like a one mile stretch. I think that they call it chemical mile or something like that. So it got more refineries in it than anywhere else in the country. Sometimes, less so now, but when I was a kid, there was a real smell to that place. I think that they've gotten better at like keeping what comes out of those places cleaner. That's what that tastes like. That tastes like the smell of the refineries on the turnpike in the 80s. Suffice to say, I don't like it. Wow. Wah, wah, wee, wah. Definitely the label I'm most afraid of. This really just looks like, it looks like something that you'd find on the shelf in a traditional Chinese medicine type shop that you would find in Chinatown, downtown New York. Yeah. I don't know. There's just something about that branding that puts, sets off my alarms. I don't know what it says. I have no idea. It might say delicious stuff in here. A thought is just occurring to me. What am I going to do with five bottles of Gaoling wine? It's a vinegary note in that. It's interesting that there are like pretty stark differences between these while also all being very much of a, of a type, of a wet dog type. That wet dog. It's not just wet dog. It's like acrid wet dog. Like wet dog that, it's like wet dog that attacks you. It's, it's really something, I'm telling you. It's such a weird thing that happens with these. When they get into your mouth, they're kind of cool, but then like, I swear it's a defensive mechanism. My mouth goes warm and produces a lot of saliva all at once. I think it's like, get it out. Get it out now. Don't drink it. I don't know. I actually have to try that again because I got very little. I was like remarkably understated, but you know, sometimes that kind of thing happens. Sometimes you just get like a, a good sip, you know, like you were just, kept your nose closed up just the right way so that you really couldn't taste it. A lot of taste is smell. So like, if you somehow, sometimes you can really fool yourself by avoiding any of the aroma of something. And I may have just done that. I don't know though. That one is pretty mild. What is that though? Like, oh, yeah, a little moldy, like musty. Yeah. Like it reminds me of, I don't know why, it reminds me of going up to New Hampshire with a friend of mine when we were kids and we stayed in these condos and they had cedar siding. And I think maybe it was a little, like a little bit moldy behind the siding, a little bit rotten, a little bit, you know, there was like a musty aroma to it. It's kind of a wet place. It's a wet dog. It's all kind of interconnected. It's all coming together now, baby. It's all coming together. Here we go. Musty juice. It's got like a tanginess on your tongue. And then it goes into, please put this dog out of its misery. Please. It's suffering. Tastes like suffering. Yeah, it's got a really weird tangy bite that I don't know what that is. Cause like, it's not, is it bitterness? No. Normally tangy is acidic, but it's not acidic at all. It's like some third wind that comes, you know what I mean? Like it's, yeah, my mouth is, I'm trying to identify it in terms that I, I can't relate to it. It's really weird. And this brings us to the beast. Says it right there. It's 58% ABV. It is 83% sorghum, 17% wheat. Kinmen Kaoling liquor. You say Kaoling wine when I bought it the first time. It's not wine. Dated. There are many other statements on here that I can't read. There are many statements inside of the label as well that I can't read. And again, I assume it's just warning you. I assume it's telling you for the love of God, don't drink this. You have so much to live for. There's a numbered thing here. One, two, three, four, and five. Maybe it's about the process behind making it. Even the glug had a kind of a, an anger in it. A disgusting sort of, sounded like it was puking back into itself. No, this one is special. Oh yeah. Like rotting seaweed. Like, oh, what's that stuff that washes up down in the Keys in the summer? Sargassum. Like rotting sargassum seaweed. Cheers. Tastes like Tester's model paint. Not obviously I've never drank model paint, but the smell of it, that makes your lips feel like they are on fire. Or maybe the model glue. I used to build air models when I was a kid and I don't know if it was the paint or the glue, but not the stuff I use now. Not the stuff I use for Warhammer miniatures, but like Tester's enamel paint and that old cement glue. It just, it's so, it dries out your mouth. You can feel the tissues on your tongue and insides just shrinking up, shriveling. It's so, I guess that's astringency. It's just so astringent. It's got that rotten ******* dog, that rotting grass, that, ah, bad hay. All of that. Oh my God. What? How? It's almost a work of art. It's so bad. I mean, it's kind of impressive at a certain level. Jesus. Well, oh my God. You're trying to cleanse your palate and then the flavor just comes back exploding on the bubbles of your seltzer. Ha! That one did it. That got it out of there. Telling you. I'm telling you, if you haven't had these, you really don't know what bad is. Malort's not pleasant. It's not good. I really don't like Ardborg, or I forget the name of those, but that's like a whole class of spirits from Scandinavia. I don't like them. This is like unpalatable. You can't imagine acquiring a taser. It seems like it's not for people to drink. It's like you put it in your mouth and your mouth is saying, it's poison. Stop. You know, it's got like warning chemicals in it or something, like the stuff that they put into propane so that you know it's there, or the stuff that they put on the Nintendo Switch cartridges so that babies don't eat it. Like, it's trying to get out of you, or rather you is trying to get out of it. I don't know. Man. Yeah, and there it is again. It just keeps coming on back. Holy... It just keeps coming back. You just taste it in the air. It taints everything. It is, oh yeah. That's opening a hot garbage can full of maggots. That smell, that decay, that's like, not the sweet kind of like dead animal over there in the woods somewhere, but like that, that hot rot, that summer maggot garbage can. That is what that is. A little bit, yep, yep. That is the taste of a certain kind of decay. That sort of boiling, rotten, ---- garbage can. Oh my God. It's back again. Yeah, spray paint. Just got a whiff of can of spray paint, right? Coming out of my nostrils from that swallow of seltzer. Oh, Krylon. The taste of Krylon. Yeah, now this one's special. Sorry. The other ones in this selection are very bad, but this one, creme de la creme, very special, which is why it's the one I'm gonna use when I have to make the decent, apparently, cocktails from this stuff. I'm convinced that whatever Baijiu Disney was using in that one drink that I was like, wow, that's not so bad. It was not that. It was something much nicer than that. And it is from Taiwan, and that was the China Pavilion, and it was, and it is. That would make sense. Why would, you know, a little animosity there. Just a little, just a touch. I know there are many, there are many, many, many, many, many Baijius out there. I tried five of them today. I tried all five that I could find in my area. I don't know how I would get my hands on a whole lot more of these. Curiata doesn't carry a whole lot of Baijiu. I don't know if they have any. And I feel like this has gotta be somewhat representative. If I pick up five of them, you know, I feel like you can't say, oh, that's the real bad one. Like, no, the other ones are totally different. They're not totally different. There are differences, but I feel like this is what this stuff tastes like, you know? I feel like I can go with that. So very soon, I'm gonna do an episode where I try to make good cocktails from this particular one, the cao liang. I predict failure. I don't think that's gonna be possible. I think that's gonna be hard. I might have to even shoot it over multiple days because honestly, I don't know how much, how many cao liang cocktails I can drink in a sitting. Ha! All right, see you guys soon in another episode of How to Drink. Good night, I love you.