Speaker 1: Guess what mango? What's that? Will? All right? So I
Speaker 1: was in a restaurant the other night and I was
Speaker 1: looking at the menu, and for some reason, I started
Speaker 1: thinking about all the names that were on the cocktail
Speaker 1: list there. I was. I was kind of bored, to
Speaker 1: be honest with you. I started thinking about these things
Speaker 1: and I saw Irish coffee on the list, and then
Speaker 1: I was even more board. So I started to wonder
Speaker 1: a little bit more about this, and I was trying
Speaker 1: to think through like whether that's offensive, you know, like
Speaker 1: you pour a little whiskey into a hot coffee and
Speaker 1: then suddenly it's Irish for some reason. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: I feel like cocktail names are so weird, right, Like
Speaker 1: white Russians had nothing to do with Russia or Mikaile
Speaker 1: burushnikof right, I mean they do have vodka, and my guess,
Speaker 1: and the same with black Russians, Like that was invented
Speaker 1: in Belgium apparently. So the weird thing is that Gabe
Speaker 1: was looking into this and the name Irish whiskey was
Speaker 1: actually a point of pride for the man who coined it.
Speaker 1: So the guy's name was Joe Sheridan, and he was
Speaker 1: the chef at an airport restaurant and the Port of
Speaker 1: Points Over in Ireland, so that that's kind of funny
Speaker 1: it was invented in an airport. But what's the story there,
Speaker 1: all right? This goes back to three and I guess
Speaker 1: at the time, there was this extremely rough winter storm
Speaker 1: going on, so planes are getting grounded and you know,
Speaker 1: passengers are stuck inside there. So Joe basically takes pity
Speaker 1: on the exhausted passengers and he offers them this mix
Speaker 1: of hot coffee and Irish whiskey kind of as a
Speaker 1: way to help them warm up. And so one American
Speaker 1: passenger inquires about this and he asked, you know, have
Speaker 1: we just been served Brazilian coffee? Well, Joe shakes his head,
Speaker 1: of course, and he said, no, sir, that's Irish coffee
Speaker 1: or drinking. Yeah, if you're glad I spared you the
Speaker 1: Irish accent there, all right. So a few weeks later,
Speaker 1: Chef Joe just convinced the restaurant owner there to add
Speaker 1: his Irish coffee to the menu, and passengers there and
Speaker 1: Foins and beyond have been enjoying it ever since. So
Speaker 1: that's just the first of nine facts about cocktails that
Speaker 1: will dig into today. Let's dive in. He their podcast listeners,
Speaker 1: Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as
Speaker 1: always I'm joined by my good friend Man Gueshow Ticketer
Speaker 1: and sitting behind the soundproof booth trying to mix himself
Speaker 1: Poos Cafe. Yeah, it's exactly what it is. You know.
Speaker 1: These are these gorgeous drinks because they look kind of
Speaker 1: like a rainbow and glass. It's like super alcoholic and
Speaker 1: they're layered, but each sip is a little bit different,
Speaker 1: and the trick is to make sure it all SIPs good.
Speaker 1: I think that's what Trista was trying to do, but
Speaker 1: it kind of came out tan, so he just poured
Speaker 1: it out and made himself a Zema with a little
Speaker 1: red skittle at the bottom. But I think that's a
Speaker 1: less savvy cocktail, to be honest, which is amazing that
Speaker 1: Tristan found a bottle of zema. They make that anymore now,
Speaker 1: they definite know. I am excited to talk about cocktails
Speaker 1: because the first one is something I've had questions about forever,
Speaker 1: and that's a Tom Collins. So the question everyone asks,
Speaker 1: who exactly was Tom Collins? And you and I are
Speaker 1: not the first person to wonder about this, and in fact,
Speaker 1: in nineteenth century New York asking folks if they knew
Speaker 1: Tom Collins was some people's favorite pastime. So the way
Speaker 1: it worked was that a stranger would come up to
Speaker 1: you in the street or whatever, and they'd tell you that,
Speaker 1: like twenty minutes earlier they saw Tom Collins trash talking you.
Speaker 1: And they say this to like anyone who listened, right,
Speaker 1: He was like talking about your clothes, your week, work ethic,
Speaker 1: the fact that you can't go left on a basketball court, whatever.
Speaker 1: And so you get all confused and flustered because you
Speaker 1: don't really know anyone named Tom Collins, and who is
Speaker 1: this guy to slander you? Right? So you asked a
Speaker 1: stranger where he saw Tom Collins last, and he directs
Speaker 1: you towards the local pub. Right, So it's like this
Speaker 1: genius marketing trick. So a few minutes later you storm
Speaker 1: in to the bar demand to see Tom Collins, at
Speaker 1: which point the bartender nods silently, fixes you a drink
Speaker 1: and he hands you with Tom Collins, which I guess
Speaker 1: is old Tom gin lemon juice and sugar, topped off
Speaker 1: with carbonated water. And the thing is right, you get
Speaker 1: to meet Tom Collins. So it's like a cute little
Speaker 1: trick and it's a nice story. And according to saucy
Speaker 1: dot com, which is a beverage sipe, the Tom Collins
Speaker 1: was a product of a nineteenth century prank for people
Speaker 1: with way too much time on their hands, and of
Speaker 1: course the bartender was actually in on the joke. Some
Speaker 1: people have suggested that the entire hoax was concocted by
Speaker 1: bar owners as a way to sell more drinks, and
Speaker 1: that the strangers on the street were actually on the
Speaker 1: bar's payrolls. But either way, what we got on the
Speaker 1: end was this tasty summary drink, which is way better
Speaker 1: than any bar fight. That's pretty cool. I'd actually wondered
Speaker 1: that one as well. A well, another name I've been
Speaker 1: thinking about recently is the screwdriver, which is a very
Speaker 1: simple cocktail. It's just one part vodka and one part
Speaker 1: orange juice. Of course, yeah, I mean, isn't it funny
Speaker 1: that's something that's simple has a name instead of just
Speaker 1: like vodka with orange and the fact that a greyhound
Speaker 1: is vodka with grapefruit juice too. But supposedly that got
Speaker 1: its name from being served at the restaurant attached at
Speaker 1: a Greyhound bus station. I guess that's super weird. I
Speaker 1: feel like I've never heard Paul Simon sing about that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean there's a little bit of questioning, you know,
Speaker 1: the veracity of all of these, But the screwdriver has
Speaker 1: a better story than this. Obviously, Americans like their vodka,
Speaker 1: and in fact, it's actually the best selling liquor in
Speaker 1: the country accounting for it's something like a third of
Speaker 1: all liquors sold last year and more than six billion
Speaker 1: dollars in sales. And of course making screwdrivers, as we said,
Speaker 1: is super simple. But if you want to stay true
Speaker 1: to the drink's roots, then you actually want to use
Speaker 1: a real screwdriver. And that's because the drink is said
Speaker 1: to have been invented by American oil workers who were
Speaker 1: stationed in the Persian Gulf. And this was back in
Speaker 1: the forties. That's funny, you know. I've obviously had that drink,
Speaker 1: but I never think it's that old. Yeah. So the
Speaker 1: workers decided to make the work day a little bit
Speaker 1: more interesting by secretly adding vodka to their morning o J.
Speaker 1: And because they didn't have any spoons handy, they stirred
Speaker 1: the drink with their screwdrivers instead, and before long the
Speaker 1: men started referring to the drink as a screwdriver now,
Speaker 1: you know, parsonally, because it was just a fun way
Speaker 1: to talk about drinking around your boss is like, you know,
Speaker 1: this job sure would be a little easier with a
Speaker 1: screw driver. Well, I mean having murky origin stories. It's
Speaker 1: kind of like a running theme with famous cocktails, and
Speaker 1: the Long Island Iced Tea is no exception. So a
Speaker 1: lot of people say the drink was first mixed during
Speaker 1: Prohibition as a way to disguise a drink as plain tea,
Speaker 1: and others say the drink was created in the nineteen
Speaker 1: seventies and this contest sponsored by a Triple Sex. So
Speaker 1: I've actually seen a video of the guy nicknamed Rosebud
Speaker 1: who supposedly invented it in the seventies, and he's just
Speaker 1: throwing this like equal parts of vodka, jin rom tequila
Speaker 1: and triple sec into a blender and a little bit
Speaker 1: of coal up. And it's not like the super Neat
Speaker 1: mixology video because he makes kind of a mess with
Speaker 1: the blender and everything. But you know, apparently he dubbed
Speaker 1: it a Long Island Iced tea because of where his
Speaker 1: bar was located. But what's incredible to me, and this
Speaker 1: is all gay during the research here, is that New
Speaker 1: York isn't the only Long Island to lay claim did
Speaker 1: this drink. Tennessee also has a Long Island of its own,
Speaker 1: and it's right in the middle of the Holston River
Speaker 1: near the town of Kingsport. So, according to the town,
Speaker 1: Long Island, iced tea was actually the creation of this
Speaker 1: local bootlegger there. His name was Charlie old Man Bishop
Speaker 1: and old Man Bishop. One day, I suppose they got
Speaker 1: a little creative. He took vodka, gin whiskey tequila and
Speaker 1: mixed them together with maple syrup, and then in the
Speaker 1: nine is so Ransom perfected the recipe by adding a
Speaker 1: little bit of citrus juice and and a little cola
Speaker 1: to the mix. And as you can imagine, the two
Speaker 1: Long Islands are at odds over who came up with
Speaker 1: this disgusting drink first. I mean, they even compete in
Speaker 1: this thing called Battle for the Tea where they blindfolded
Speaker 1: bar patrons and gave them each of the regions tease
Speaker 1: and everyone voted for their favorite. But unfortunately they made
Speaker 1: it a best of two match. So both Long Islands
Speaker 1: have actually won one round each and there's no third
Speaker 1: round schedule. Sounds like they've had a few of them
Speaker 1: before they came up with that idea for a best
Speaker 1: of two. I also feel like we should grab a
Speaker 1: few folks from the Savor team and have a little
Speaker 1: office test and kind of choose for ourselves. But yeah, alright, Well,
Speaker 1: speaking of murky origins, why don't we talk about the Cosmopolitan,
Speaker 1: which claims two stories of its own own, actually none
Speaker 1: of which I'm guessing have to do with Sex in
Speaker 1: the City. Well, here's the weird thing is that one
Speaker 1: of them actually does. So one option is that the
Speaker 1: drink got its start in the mid nineteen eighties at
Speaker 1: a bar in Miami South Beach. So, according to legend,
Speaker 1: a woman named Cheryl Cook invented it, and it was
Speaker 1: supposed to be like a more feminine take on the
Speaker 1: Martini because she had noticed that many women seemed to
Speaker 1: enjoy the shape of the classic Martini glass more than
Speaker 1: the taste of the actual drink that it came with.
Speaker 1: So here's where the Sex and the City connection comes in.
Speaker 1: Cook claims that the show's mother daughter costume design team
Speaker 1: had been customers at her bar for like fifteen years
Speaker 1: before the show started, So the inclusion of the Cosmo
Speaker 1: on the show might have actually been a fun nod
Speaker 1: to cook. That's interesting, and the show actually did revitalize
Speaker 1: the cocktail from from what I know, I mean kind
Speaker 1: of the same way as Sideways got people to stop
Speaker 1: drinking more low yeah, or the way you know everybody
Speaker 1: started drinking white Russians right after the Big Lebowski. You know,
Speaker 1: there's there's actually another great story that could also be
Speaker 1: the starting point for the Cosmopolitan as well. So according
Speaker 1: to an African American bartender named Neil Murray, he invented
Speaker 1: the drink back in nine and this was as a
Speaker 1: way of asserting himself at the bar that was under
Speaker 1: racist management at the time. Now, the story goes that
Speaker 1: Murray had interviewed to be a bartender at the Cork
Speaker 1: and Clever Bar in Minneapolis earlier that year, but despite
Speaker 1: having a pretty good interview, he was actually later told
Speaker 1: by a friend that the managers passed on him simply
Speaker 1: because he was black. Still, the staff was on Murray's side,
Speaker 1: so when management went away for the weekend, the staff
Speaker 1: slip trained him. Over the course of three days and
Speaker 1: put him on the payroll. Then the managers agreed to
Speaker 1: try him out once they returned. But here's the backstory
Speaker 1: to the drink. So one night not too long after,
Speaker 1: Murray was mixing up a popular cocktail called the Comic
Speaker 1: Kaze when he decided to add a splash of cranberry
Speaker 1: juice to the mix. Now, the customer loved the extra
Speaker 1: fruity punch and asked Murray what had inspired him to
Speaker 1: add it, and Murray just said it just felt like
Speaker 1: it needed a little color. So the customer responds that
Speaker 1: it looks very cosmopolitan, and that's how the drink and
Speaker 1: actually got its name. But the funniest part is that
Speaker 1: Murray says he started ordering the drink and every town
Speaker 1: he passed through after that, so he would go to
Speaker 1: a bar and order a Cosmopolitan, and when they had
Speaker 1: asked him to remind him what it was, Murray would
Speaker 1: tell them that it was a Kama Kaze with cranberry juice.
Speaker 1: So bartender suggested the drink to customers, and the drink
Speaker 1: gradually spread from coast to coast. Have you ever heard
Speaker 1: that This American Life, where Sarah Kanig is talking about
Speaker 1: her dad who's this legendary admin. He wrote the old
Speaker 1: Volkswagen thinks small ad and lemonads, and he's you know,
Speaker 1: kind of known as a genius. But he also makes
Speaker 1: these outrageous claims, Like one of the things he claims
Speaker 1: is that no one used to eat shrimp in New
Speaker 1: York before he came to town, and he just kept
Speaker 1: asking people for pulling peel shrimp, eating it on docs
Speaker 1: and stuff, and suddenly, like the whole town was into it.
Speaker 1: He also claimed he invented thumb wrestling. I would be
Speaker 1: so star struck, but who knows, maybe you did. But
Speaker 1: speaking of crazy ideas that took off, I'm going to
Speaker 1: talk about a non alcoholic cocktail, and that's the Arnold Palmer.
Speaker 1: I feel we've talked about this one before, haven't we.
Speaker 1: That's right, But you know, as you'd imagine, legendary golfer
Speaker 1: Arnold Palmer was not the first to combine iced tea
Speaker 1: with lemonade, but he was the first to popularize to drink.
Speaker 1: You know, this is something that I order from time
Speaker 1: to time, but I always get a little nervous before
Speaker 1: I say it. And my kids actually made fun of
Speaker 1: me because I have a hard time saying without really
Speaker 1: slowing down, saying Arnold Palmer. So they like to wait
Speaker 1: for me to say an Arner Palmer. So I do
Speaker 1: love that old ESPN commercial. Whether they're in this cafeteria
Speaker 1: and these two sportscasters are they're just watching is Arnold
Speaker 1: Palmer goes up to the dispenser and he fills his
Speaker 1: glass half with lemonade than half with iced tea, and
Speaker 1: then he walks away, and they go, that was awesome.
Speaker 1: I love that. And you know, I'm sure there's plenty
Speaker 1: of people out there who can't say Arnold Palmer. So like, yeah,
Speaker 1: so we should just call it an Arnie Palmy. I
Speaker 1: like that. I like it. Well, the name of the
Speaker 1: drink goes back to the late sixties and and this
Speaker 1: is when this woman happened to overhear Palmer ordering his
Speaker 1: favorite drink at a bar in Palm Springs, and she
Speaker 1: apparently was star struck. Right, she was a huge fan,
Speaker 1: so she immediately ordered one of the same and simply
Speaker 1: referred to it as that Palmer drink. Another way you
Speaker 1: and I can refer to it, And that's how it
Speaker 1: kind of took off. But more official connection was made
Speaker 1: years later when Palmer licensed both his name and image
Speaker 1: to branded versions of the drinks. But you know, in
Speaker 1: the early days, it was just his fans requesting the drink,
Speaker 1: and and that's sort of how it's spread. But here's
Speaker 1: what's funny. If you want to mix up your own
Speaker 1: Arnold Palmer at home, you actually have to decide which
Speaker 1: ratio to use. Normally, the drink is served fifty fifty,
Speaker 1: also known as a half and half to non Palmer fans.
Speaker 1: Palmer actually preferred sent tea to lemonade mix, but his
Speaker 1: wife was this total sweet tooth, and so she'd use
Speaker 1: sweet tea and lemonade, and her versions called a wind
Speaker 1: Palmer after the namesake. And you know, just because I
Speaker 1: have to say this, Arnold Palmer's dentist used to be
Speaker 1: in Delaware for some reason. He used to come to
Speaker 1: Delaware to get his teeth done. So I would just
Speaker 1: feel like, that's in fact every where should know. I
Speaker 1: don't know why you know that, but anyway, we've got
Speaker 1: a few more cocktail origins to get to. But first
Speaker 1: let's take a quick break. Welcome back to Part Time Genius,
Speaker 1: where we're talking drink origins. Now I'm gonna stick with
Speaker 1: your mocktail theme and talk about the grandmother of all
Speaker 1: mock tails, which is, of course, the Shirley Temple. So
Speaker 1: as you might imagine, this mixture of ginger ale, grenadine
Speaker 1: and Americino on top was reportedly served to the child
Speaker 1: actress Shirley Temple starting in the late nineteen thirties, and
Speaker 1: in true cocktail fashion, there is some disagreement on where
Speaker 1: and when the drink originated. There was this Beverly Hills
Speaker 1: restaurant called Chasen's that claims to have invented the drink
Speaker 1: on Temple's tenth birthday so she'd have something special to
Speaker 1: sit on when she dined with her parents. And you know,
Speaker 1: while the Brown Derby restaurant claims to be the true
Speaker 1: home of the drink, also the Royal Hawaiian Hotel in
Speaker 1: Wakiki claims that they were the first to mix it
Speaker 1: for But the funny part is that while all these
Speaker 1: places claimed they invented it for her, Shirley Temple actually
Speaker 1: wasn't a fan of the drink. She reportedly found it
Speaker 1: to be much too sweet for her taste, which is amazing.
Speaker 1: It feels like such an insult coming from a child. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, apparently the only thing she found more distasteful
Speaker 1: was when companies tried to market a bottle cherry soda
Speaker 1: called the Shirley Temple in the nineteen eighties. She responded
Speaker 1: by filing multiple civil lawsuits claiming her name was not
Speaker 1: a generic term and that the use of it was
Speaker 1: an invasion of her privacy. And the company's actually eventually
Speaker 1: back down. That's pretty amazing. I mean, I do know
Speaker 1: she was super smart, right, like she was supposedly like
Speaker 1: this ambassador or diplomat. Yeah, that's true, and I believe
Speaker 1: it was to Czechoslovakia. But since I did a Shirley
Speaker 1: Temple fact, I think I should tackle its sibling cocktail
Speaker 1: while I'm at it, And that's the Roy Rogers. So
Speaker 1: one of my favorite scenes on Dirty Rock is when
Speaker 1: Alec Baldwin's at this far and he orders this really
Speaker 1: fruit fru drink, like I think it's like a white
Speaker 1: rum with diet ginger ale and a splash of lime
Speaker 1: or something, and the bartender says, sir, here's your Nancy Drew,
Speaker 1: and Alec Baldwin is just so offended and he says,
Speaker 1: for men, it's called a hardy boy. I know why
Speaker 1: that line is so funny to be but the idea
Speaker 1: that we need like a coke version of the Shirley
Speaker 1: Temple to appeal to boys is just so dumb. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're right, it's pretty ridiculous. And and sometimes the Shirley
Speaker 1: Temple with cola substituted in for ginger ale is also
Speaker 1: called a Shirley Temple black, which also happened to be
Speaker 1: Shirley's married name. But the reason the mocktail is interesting
Speaker 1: is that it's also named for Rory Rogers, you know,
Speaker 1: the cowboy actor who later owned his own fast food place.
Speaker 1: But apparently Rogers was a teetotaler, and I always thought
Speaker 1: that it was given the cowboy name Roy Rogers just
Speaker 1: to appeal to boys. But supposedly he actually had the
Speaker 1: drink mixed up for him on set when he was
Speaker 1: shooting westerns on TV. And this was, of course, back
Speaker 1: in the nineteen forties, so it's been around for a while.
Speaker 1: That's interesting that he actually liked the drink wheer Shirley Temple. Hey,
Speaker 1: but you know, I got to cat this with a
Speaker 1: proper cocktail. Fact, and this one's about the my tie.
Speaker 1: So Gabe has been trying to get us to do
Speaker 1: a show on TIQ culture for a while now, and
Speaker 1: we'll definitely get to a game, don't worry. But this
Speaker 1: story comes from him. So most people associate the my
Speaker 1: Taie with Hawaii, likely because of the name, which means
Speaker 1: good or nice Intohitian, but the drink was actually the
Speaker 1: creation of this Oakland bartender named Victor burger On. He's
Speaker 1: also known as Traitor Vic, you might know, and this
Speaker 1: was back in a few years later. Vic was hired
Speaker 1: to create a cocktail menu for a Hawaiian cruise line
Speaker 1: and also the sister hotel, the Royal Hawaiian, So he
Speaker 1: put on the menu, but he really wasn't confident about it,
Speaker 1: so he kind of stuck the my Time near the
Speaker 1: bottom of the list, and of course it became this
Speaker 1: immediate hit, partially because people assumed it was a Hawaiian
Speaker 1: drink and they just wanted to blend in with the locals.
Speaker 1: But the downside to the success is that Vic felt
Speaker 1: the need to protect his recipes from the public, which
Speaker 1: made it difficult for other bartenders to recreate the drink,
Speaker 1: and as a result, there all these different versions of
Speaker 1: the drink on the market now, so like some use
Speaker 1: way too much pineapple juice or grenadine and they're like
Speaker 1: sickly sweet. Some aren't sweet but just taste disgusting. And
Speaker 1: this is all why the ma Taie is sometimes called
Speaker 1: the most abused cocktail in the world. But if you're
Speaker 1: looking for a true my tie, it should include just
Speaker 1: a handful of ingredients rum, orange liquor, almond syrup, simple syrup,
Speaker 1: and freshly squeezed lime juice, and it's topped with freshman. Oh.
Speaker 1: I like that. Yeah, I like the fact that things
Speaker 1: are getting even more wild out there. I think Tristan
Speaker 1: pulled out as that his third Sema of the day
Speaker 1: four pack. You know, I feel like we've covered a
Speaker 1: lot today that drinks shouldn't be gender that you know,
Speaker 1: drinking on the job was a thing that happened with
Speaker 1: screw drivers, sex in the city, Arnold Palmer's thinnest. But
Speaker 1: I do feel like the fact I like the most
Speaker 1: was the one about Tom Collins talking trash about you
Speaker 1: last night in a bar. That was pretty good. I agreed,
Speaker 1: I will not stand for it, So let's take Kristen
Speaker 1: and go find Tom instead of straight. But you know,
Speaker 1: Gave actually texted me right before this, and he said,
Speaker 1: I'm going to read from the email if you get
Speaker 1: a chance, toss out a mention of the Jersey Turnpike,
Speaker 1: a notorious lost a bet cocktail where the server flips
Speaker 1: the bar mat, collects the liquid run off, and then
Speaker 1: completes the drink by ringing a used bar rag straight
Speaker 1: into a glass, which is so Grossot. You know, I
Speaker 1: do want to thank you for the trophy this week,
Speaker 1: and to all of you out there, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for sending fact. It really makes it other day.
Speaker 1: You know, we got this Twitter fact from Robert Vogel, who,
Speaker 1: after our Raccoons episode told us about the Madison, Alabama
Speaker 1: new baseball team they've got. It's a double A team
Speaker 1: called the Rocket City trash Pandas and I love this name.
Speaker 1: So my son and I have already agreed that there
Speaker 1: are new favorite double A team and keep those facts coming,
Speaker 1: but from all of us here at part time, Genius
Speaker 1: gave Tristan, Will and me thank you so much for
Speaker 1: listening to the b