AlcoHAWK Personal Breathalyzer Roundup
How drunk are you? No, really? How do you know?
If you're a regular imbiber, it's a good idea to test yourself once in awhile to make sure you're OK to drive. 0.08 percent blood alcohol content (BAC) is the maximum legal level in most states, but knowing if you're over that threshold can be difficult (particularly as you get closer and closer to it).
Portable blood alcohol testers can be helpful, but many require patience and luck to get them to work properly. Here's a look at two very different models from AlcoHAWK, one of the leaders in personal breath analyzers.
AlcoHAWK Slim Ultra fits in a pocket and is about the size of a cell phone. The unit works well... when it works. Making that happen requires blowing into the unit for five seconds, turning it on, then waiting for it to count down from 100 to zero, a process that can take several minutes. Then, more often than not, the unit signals that it has an error. You have to repeat the entire process from scratch, then hope for the best. Sometimes you need one reboot, sometimes four. We never got it to work right on the first try, but when we did finally get it going, it offered results exactly in line with the more professional tester (accurate to three decimal places) that we had to compare with. B / $50 [BUY IT HERE] (pictured)
AlcoHAWK One Test is a single-use breath alcohol tester that has pretty limited value no matter what you've been up to that evening. It's a slim tube the size of a cigarette that works only once. To use it, you puncture both ends, then blow into it like a straw. You then wait basically wait until the yellow crystals inside turn green. If the level of greenness crosses the line and red dot on the tube, you're over 0.05% BAC -- and presumably you shouldn't drive. The accuracy is questionable, and I imagine if you are drunk enough to see a lot of green crystals in here, you know you shouldn't be driving anywhere. But at least it's portable. C / $20 for five [BUY IT HERE]
Review: Samuel Adams Pint Glass
There are nearly as many types of beer glasses out there as there are wine glasses. A few years back Samuel Adams created this custom glass -- designed specifically for its Boston Lager -- and unlike any other beer glass in my collection.
I'll let the company explain: "The brewers worked with a team of world-renowned sensory experts to develop a glass that would enhance the tasting experience of Boston Lager, similar to the way different wine glasses are designed to enhance the flavor of wines. The glass features the turbulator, which is a bead on the inside rim, this creates turbulence as you sip the beer, releasing the aroma. It has a laser etched nucleation site at the bottom that creates bubbles to maintain flavor release. Bubbles come up from the bottom, similar to a champagne glass."
I tried it out (with some Pliny the Elder) and agree that it really is a great glass. It has weight, unlike some delicate crystal glassware, which feels like it will break apart in your hand and which doesn't keep your beer cold enough. The outward turned lip makes it easy to drink from. And -- bonus -- it fits easily in the dishwasher at the end of the night.
At $30 for four glasses (cheaper if you shop around), it's also a great deal.
A / $30 for 4 / samueladams.com
Review: WineOff Stain Remover
When one drinks a lot of wine, one spills a lot of wine.
Result: Many an article of clothing, napkin, and tablecloth stained purple.
While wine stain removal products are legion, WineOff, which I put to the test recently, is exceptional at the job. Just spray the stain and it goes to work. There is no alcohol, bleach, or hydrogen peroxide here, but rather a mix of "friendly" bacteria and enzymes that eat away the stain. Bacteria just love to drink wine, it seems.
And it works really well. I tried WineOff on some ancient wine stains on tablecloths that had been through the wash dozens of times, and it was effective at lifting them off almost completely after a spray and a wash. A few stubborn stains remained behind (and it does not do anything at all for other types of stains)... but I can't fault WineOff for having about a 90% effectiveness rate.
The company behind WineOff, Bio-Pro, also produces CoffeeOff and UrineOff, the usage of which I'll leave to your imagination.
A- / price TK / bio-proresearch.com
“Glass Tasting” with Maximilian Riedel
As an 11th generation descendant of the Riedel crystal empire, it's safe to say that Maximilian has glass in his blood. Today, Riedel is synonymous with quality glassware, its empire unmatched by its competition in either size or stature.
Recently I had the opportunity to attend a seminar hosted by Max, who had the goal of proving to his audience that quality glassware really does make a difference when it comes to the enjoyment of wine.
I've been a bit of a skeptic for years, figuring that if you had a decent glass you were probably going to get everything a wine could give you. Paper cup, no. Big glass? Anything will likely do for any wine.
Riedel sees it differently, and the Austrian company produces dozens of glasses for every type of wine you might want to drink. The idea is that the shape of the glass can affect its nose, and the shape of the bowl can impact where the wine lands on your palate when you drink it.
It all sounds a little silly, but Riedel is nothing if not convincing, and in a clearly well-rehearsed seminar (mainly directed at restaurant owners which Riedel would like to be customers), I was persuaded -- at least to a degree.
We tasted a variety of wines, including 2007 Italian chardonnay, 1996 Spatlese Riesling, 2006 St. Estephe, and a vintage-unannounced Southern California Pinot Noir, all paired with the "right" glass from Riedel's top-end Vitis line of stemware.
And then we tried the wines from stubby "joker" IKEA glasses -- and even from a plastic cup.
The difference was striking. As Riedel suggested, the small glass muted the sweetness of the Riesling and killed the Chardonnay's fruit on the nose and in the body. The plastic cup was even worse. With its flared-out rim, there was no aroma at all in these wines. The wines we were drinking, so present in the crystal stemware, could have been anything in the plastic cup. I've noticed this firsthand before in budget wine events (like those at retail stores). There's almost no point to drinking wine this way; it just doesn't taste any good.
I was less convinced by Riedel's Vitis vs. Vitis challenge. Any differences in the taste and nose of, say, the Pinot Noir when served in the "proper" glass vs. the near-identical Chardonnay glass were elusive to a fault. I'd argue any minute residue of an earlier wine in one glass or another probably had a greater effect on the taste of the wine than an even measurable difference in the shape of the glass's bowl.
The decanting experiment was also illustrative but not earth shattering. Riedel poured two wines for us into the same glasses, then "revealed" in the end that they were actually the same wine, one decanted and one not. Hardly a shock; the decanted wine was indeed fuller and less green, but they were obviously the same wine from the start. Nothing against decanting -- I'm certainly a fan, when I have the time and patience -- but it was not the slam-bang finale to an instructive experience that one might have hoped for.
So color me a convert to Riedel and, more importantly, high-quality glassware. Get rid of those freebies you get when you visit a winery and invest in something worth drinking for. And here's another hint from the pros: You don't have to hand-wash crystal either... even Riedel puts it in the dishwasher.
Review: Spiegelau Classics Tall Pilsner Glass
Spiegelau enhances is line of beer glassware with a fourth progeny: A tall pilsner intended for, you guessed it, light pilsner beers.
This 12-ounce container is surprisingly thin -- almost champagne-flute-like in design, with an indentation near the base and a slowly widening upper section. The look is quite striking, and it's definitely a conversation piece. Ultimately I prefer a tulip glass or even Spiegelau's wider lager glass for everyday beer styles, since the pilsner hits you square in the bridge of the nose as you drink from it, but for enhancing the appearance of a bottle of ale, well, the Tall Pilsner knows no equal.
A- / $10 each / spiegelau.com
Review: Vacu Vin Rapid Ice Beer Chiller
I'm an avowed fan of the Vacu Vin Rapid Ice Wine Chiller, which can take a bottle of white wine from cellar temp to ready-to-drink in under ten minutes, and as a result I had high hopes for Vacu Vin's Rapid Ice Beer Chiller.
The theory is simple: A cylinder of re-freezable ice packs envelops your bottle, chilling it quickly. The beer bottle version not only shrinks the pack down to 12-oz. size, it also puts a delightful bit of frothy beer art on the exterior to get you in the mood.
Too bad it doesn't really work all that well. With the reduced surface area and (likely) higher starting temperature of your beer, it takes at least half an hour to get your beer down to a drinkable temperature, and even then it's dicey. By the time the Vacu Vin got warm to the touch, my beer still wasn't as cold as I'd have liked it.
Overall this is a fine gadget if you want to keep an already cold beer chilly, but it's not ideal for quickly cooling down something that's starting warm.
C / $14 for two / [BUY IT HERE]
Review: Wine Swirl Wine Aeration System
Are your arms wildly misshapen or underpowered for your size, like a T. Rex? If so, you might need Wine Swirl, an automated "wine aerator" that will swirl the living hell out of your fermented grape juice with little more than a flick of the wrist.
Wine Swirl may look a bit scientific because, frankly, it is. It's the exact same thing used in chemistry labs to mix reagents and potions and stuff: The electrically-powered base includes a spinning metal component; you drop a small rectangular magnet into your decanter (the provided one or your own), and turn the knob on the base to make it go. The swirling action is actually pretty impressive, creating a vortex that extends all the way down to the bottom of the decanter.
Results: Less than a minute in the Wine Swirl will soften up even the hardest, most inaccessible of wines. But is the effect much more impressive than you can achieve on your own by vigorously swirling wine in a big glass for a few seconds? Well, not really. And having to fish a tiny magnet out of your wine (these things are destined to get lost, I'm afraid) with a special metal rod sort of ruins the mystique of your wine experience even more than a screw cap does.
Now having a piece of scientific equipment on your bar is one thing. Paying $150 for it is another... Yeah, it works, but is it worth it? At least watch the video on their website before you judge. Oooooh, a whirlpool!
B- / $150 / wineswirl.com
Review: Brugo Travel Mug
By now every urban legend fanatic knows what a deadly menace too-hot coffee can be. Between the scorched privates and scaled tongues, it's a miracle anyone drinks this stuff at all.
How do you get your coffee down to a tolerable temperature without it getting too cold? Brugo's answer is an elaborate travel mug with a unique lid.
Tighten on the custom lid and turn the dial to "tip and cool" then rock the cup back and forth a bit. The coffee (or tea, or whatnot) fills a special channel in the lid designed to quickly cool the drink. You then drink it normally through the usual sippy-cup-style opening.
If that leaves you with too chilly a drink you can always bypass the channel with the "sip" setting and get full-temperature, scalding-hot coffee.
Brugo sounds great in theory but it's asking an awful lot of a caffeine-deprived sleepyhead at 8 in the morning. Filling the channel with the rocking motion just the right way is the hard part, especially since you have to do that with every sip you take. If you're like me, you either get no coffee in the sip channel, or you shake it so hard it flies out all over your hand. And it's still hot when that happens, folks.
Nice idea, but the execution is too tricky, especially while you're driving. Works fine, though, if you just use the regular "sip" setting... provided you can actually get the lid off...
Available in about a dozen colors. Holds 16 oz. in an ergonomic chassis.
C- / $20 / brugomug.com
Hands-On: Apollo Single-Serving Blender and Grinder
Smoothies for one? Who wants to break out the giant blender, then clean up the mess afterwards, just for a single-serve drink?
Enter Tribest's Apollo AP-200, a pint-size blender with vessels that let you mix drinks or grind solid objects in single-serve doses.
The AP-200 is so simple it doesn't even have an on-off switch. The unique design works such that it doesn't need on. To use it, you load up a cup (four are included, two 1-cup sizes and two 2-cup sizes; two blades -- one dry, one wet -- are also included) with whatever you'd like, then screw a blade attachment on top, which works as a sealed lid. Turn it over and place it on the blender base and as you press down, it activates, causing the blades to spin. When you're done, just take it off, unscrew the lid, and drink it right out of the cup -- unlike standard blenders there's no blade at the bottom to get in your way.
The unique design of the Apollo takes some getting used to, but as a blender it works fairly well, chopping down fruit and ice with reasonable success. I especially liked how easy it was to clean up -- just two pieces to go in the dishwasher when you're done, and you don't even need a separate cup to hold your bounty.
Sure, if your regular blender works well you probably don't need the Apollo, but for singles, small kitchens, or for stowing under your bar for the one-off frozen drink, it's a hit.
$40 / personalblender.com [BUY IT HERE]
