The other night, I had a dream that I was at Lorde’s house, and Taylor Swift’s cats were also there. I think her house somehow had a bar, but in a different part of the house from where she made my drink. Classic dream, am I rite?
According to wiseoldsayings.com, “A dream doesn’t become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination, and hard work.” In an ideal world, my dream of Lorde making me a cocktail would come true through the development of a chance friendship in an online forum about having really thick curly hair. Since the world is maybe the least ideal it’s ever been, I decided that figuring out the ingredients to the cocktail might be the closest I could get.
In order to recreate this cocktail, I decided my budget would be $50 because it’s my birthday soon and I cut my teeth on wedding rings, in the movies, or whatever. (I always forget about the song “Royals” because it was overwritten in my brain by the This Hour Has 22 Minutes parody, Tories).
So, in the dream, the cocktail seemed to be a sort of gin and tonic where the bottom was orange, but the top was clear and had a sort of orange / citrus / pine taste.
My plan was to mix tonic water, gin, and some sort of orange alcohol (liqueur?? Is that what I’m supposed to say?) Since my primary drink of choice is Raspberry Sourpuss, I needed to ask for recommendations. Some people who know how alcohol works told me to try Triple Sec, Cointreau, or Aperol. Before heading to the store, I Google Imaged all those drinks and decided Aperol was my best bet since the visual impressed me much more than the flavour, and dream tasting isn’t really even a thing, unless other people experience that and no one has told me.
Once at the LCBO, the Aperol was $30 and only 11 percent alcohol, which disappointed me, as part of the purpose of this whole thing was getting alcohol for my new apartment to make me forget that for the last four days the main entrance has been locked both in and out and you have to use the back door and the Amazon man bringing me my Command Strips got locked inside and I still feel really bad so if you’re reading this Amazon man, I’ll make you a drink once this is all over.
I decided that, just to get the orange colour, I would buy a case of four premade Aperol spritz, which was only $12.95 and 5 percent alcohol, but I’d make that up with the gin. I carried those over to the gin aisle to acquire gin, but then God smiled on me and I found orange coloured and flavoured gin for $30.95 which is okay because it’s 41.3 percent alcohol.
So, total price, including soda water and what I believe is the price I pay for utilities divided by the amount of water I used for the four ice cubes came to around $37.99, which might be the most money anyone has ever spent for the purpose of a Stranded article, but don’t quote me on that.
So, folks, I guess what I’m saying here is that I’m not in the swing of things (understanding how alcohol works + getting people to believe that “Still Sane” is the best Lorde song), but what I really mean is that I’m not in the swing of things yet. Also, I just want to publicly bring to everyone’s attention how hard it is to get non-flavoured soda water in the year of our Lorde 2020. I went to Shoppers after the LCBO and all I could find was lime-watermelon flavoured water, which shouldn’t be a flavour. The first time I tried this recipe, it was with the lime-watermelon water (there’s already water in water?????? Not a flavour???) and I couldn’t tell if it was good bc all I could taste was the fact that this soda water was left overnight in a truck that also had limes and watermelons in it. Let me have water flavoured water!!!!!! I know this doesn’t fit into the flow (haha water) of the article but I can’t stop thinking about it. Anyways, after such a long wait, here is:
The cocktail Lorde made me in a dream, the recipe
330ml tonic water
Four ice cubes, shaped like the Pi symbol
Put all these in your roommate’s drink mixer thing, shake it all together (I really have no idea if you’re supposed to shake already fizzy things, but it was fun and made me feel cool), and serve in a clear glass. Pairs well with cheap pistachios you bought from the College and Spadina Rexall because the vegan treat you wanted was $5 so you got $1.50 pistachios instead and they were kinda rotten so now you’re out $1.50 and have no snack. Also, consider knowing Lorde and get her to make it for you. See the attached visuals:
Has anyone ever shopped at Electric Smoke Site? :-)