If you're in college, you probably don't pay too much attention to the particulars of alcohol.
No one's judging you—you're probably experiencing "the good stuff" for the first time, building a palette, introducing yourself to a multitude of very, very cheap beverages. Who cares about classy martinis and craft beer? You're happy with strawberry Svedka and a chaser.
But everything has a story; booze is no different. And while you may not care about anything other than the proof on the bottle, you may want to consider the origin of the liquid inside.
One very specific beverage tells a unique tale, a tale that embodies the heart and soul of American ingenuity.
This is the abridged version of the origins of the Moscow Mule. And like any secondhand account, it's probably riddled with factual holes and plugged up with embellishments.
Yeah, you could probably look up the story on another site and get all the names and dates and places like I did, but like I said. This is the abridged version. No silly details.
Like most stories worth telling (and most Dungeons and Dragons campaigns), this one starts in a bar. Some guy is moping to his buddy, the bartender, about this new product that he just cannot seem to sell. The product? Vodka.
See, back in the '30s, the heyday of cocktails and mixed drinks, vodka was not popular. Far from it. In fact, people used to joke that "vodka" was Russian for "horrible." And who can blame them? The stuff tastes like hand sanitizer. Even the ritzy top-shelf varieties beg to be combined with the cheapest mixer.
No, back in the grand old days of fedoras and boas, people drank gin. Gin tastes like Christmas, not fermented potatoes and broken dreams.
So the guy who just bought a tiny vodka company complained. And the bartender, naturally, one-upped him.
The bartender, who owned this particular bar on the Sunset Strip of Hollywood, liked to make beer. Ginger beer. Now answer me this, who's gonna meet with his buddies after a long, hard day of work and order a ginger beer? Not exactly what you'd call manly. And this is the 1940s, we're talking about.
So both of these guys were sitting on a mountain of product nobody wanted, in a town that's all about who's who.
A third party, that even the Internet can't seem to pinpoint (probably because she was supposedly a woman), also had a little shop that made copper mugs. Neat, but people didn't actually buy them, like lawn ornaments made out of scrap iron, or jewelry made out of old sterling silverware.
Anyway, our boozy protagonists had a drunken idea: mix 'em. Two ounces of cough-inducing vodka, a bottle of nancy-boy ginger beer, and a squirt of lime inside of a ridiculously shiny mug.
Voi-friggin'-la.
Oh, and that tiny vodka brand that the guy bought? It was Smirnoff.
The guys called in all their favors to advertise and idealize the drink, moving from bar to bar, convincing the owners that the drink was as tasty and refreshing as it was obscure.
Since the invention of this single drink, vodka has become the main white liquor in almost all cocktails and mixed drinks. Even today, the drink is probably the only one served in a copper mug, mostly for tradition's sake. Timeless.
Think about that next time you pop a bottle.
The next time you're down on your luck, commiserate with your buddies at the bar and put your halves together. As always, I'm sure a little booze will lubricate the process.
