# Buying Cock-Ale.

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-cock-ale/750612>\
**Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\
**Created:** [March 30, 2016, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-cock-ale/750612 "2016-03-30T05:17:54Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Jim\_B](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jim_b/32/4338_2.png) [@Jim\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_B)\
**Post date:** [March 30, 2016, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-cock-ale/750612/1 "2016-03-30T05:17:54Z")

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I honestly don’t know if this is the right section of the boards for this. But as you can see, in [What’s the origin of “cocktail”?](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1765/whats-the-origin-of-cocktail) by SDStaff Gaudere, she describes Cock-Ale:

> [@](#):
>
> Take 10 gallons of ale and a large cock, the older the better; parboil the cock, flay him, and stamp him in a stone mortar until his bones are broken (you must gut him when you flaw him). Then, put the cock into two quarts of sack, and put to it five pounds of raisins of the sun-stoned; some blades of mace, and a few cloves. Put all these into a canvas bag, and a little before you find the ale has been working, put the bag and ale together in vessel. In a week or nine days bottle it up, fill the bottle just above the neck and give it the same time to ripen as other ale.

Anyways, I have no intention of making it from scratch (it sounds rather brutal anyways). But does anyone know of a commercial distributor to sells it? FYI, I live in SE Michigan.

🙂