A teetotaler friend of mine asked a bunch of us hard drinkers about this. We hard drinkers at first confusedly told him that vodka was the least liquory of liquors. But that is not what he meant at all. He wanted to have a shot of something that tasted good and would fool his tongue into not knowing it was drinking something alcoholic. Finally he was given a taste of Amaretto, which he enjoyed. He enjoyed it so much we had to take it away from him. We didn’t want him to get sick.
Other liquors we thought of later: Malibu and Tequila Rose. What unalcohol-y drinks can you think of and what is your opinion of the alcohol taste of these different drinks?
If you want to get into drinks, I’d go with a frozen margarita. That’s probably the easiest thing to start on. Even just the buckets you add the tequila to and toss in the freezer are pretty good. I’d go with strawberry. Come to think of it, the Jose Cuervo ready made strawberry margarita bottles, over ice, are really good as well and don’t have much alcohol taste to them at all. Either that or Smirnoff Ice/Triple Black/Twisted. They’re so sweet it’s almost like drinking regular soda or juice.
Limoncello is somewhat more liquor-y than amaretto, but it might do the trick served over ice. Kahlua might be a good thing to try as well. If he likes amaretto, then anything from the liqueur section of your local liquor store would be a good bet. Take him there and let him pick something.
If you’re looking to mix something, remember the four easy ways to hide the taste of alcohol, well known to frat boys everywhere:
–Ice. Cold can mask alcohol’s taste.
–Sugar. Sweetness helps mellow the bite of hard alcohol.
–Carbonation. Fizz helps cover the bite of stong liquor.
–Citrus. Sour citrus fruits can partly overpower hard alcohol.
Lots of popular drinks include one or more of these things. Whiskey and Coke has sugar, carbonation, and usually ice. Martinis include sweet vermouth. Gin and tonics have fizzy tonic water. Margaritas have sugar, ice, and lots of citrus.
Of course! One of the four of us must have mentioned it. Have you ever put it in a blender with some vodka and ice cream? Of course you pay in the bathroom the next day but, YUM!
P.S. for the answer to the thread title, I do mean unmixed drinks but I sure won’t complain if people post non-alcohol tasting mixed drinks. Also, Long Island Ice Teas taste plenty alcoholic, they just hide how much of a kick they have under an illusion of ice teaness.
I don’t know what it is about tonic, but just a splash and the taste of alcohol just disappears. I cannot drink Gin or vodka straight, but fill up a glass with ice and vodka/gin almost to the top and a little bit tonic (90/10 ratio or so) and it goes down like water. Oddly though, tonic tastes terrible on it’s own. I always tell people if you don’t want a lot to drink don’t ask for a weak vodka/gin and tonic. Get a regular one and drink less or just have the bartender make a smaller one. If you get a weaker one with more tonic it’ll taste awful.
I was going to say Bailey’s or some other cream based liquor. If you want a cheap buzz you can buy pre-mixed “cocktails” like bloody marys, mudslides, pina coladas, and white russians. You can also buy a bottle of stuff called Orange Dream, Strawberry Shortcake, or I’m Bananas Over You
And lots of alcohol. A typical margarita recipe is three parts tequila, two parts lime juice, and one part triple sex. Considering 80 proof (40% alcohol) is common for tequila and triple sex and you can see there’s a lot of alcohol in this. But as you note, the ice and the taste of the other ingredients hide that alcohol.
I’m normally the first to recommend ouzo, but if the drinker wants drinks that don’t taste like alcohol, it’s a poor choice. It’s very strong, and it tastes like it, too. Cut liberally with water and ice, it might fit the bill.
(Seriously, while I’m a decent speller, I’m a terrible typist. You guys are lucky you don’t see these posts before they’re spell checked. Unfortunately, when I mistype a word like sec into another real word like sex, my spell checker lets it go. And out of laziness, I’ve become too dependent on spell checking to catch my mistakes and don’t always check myself.)