“For relaxing times, make it Suntory time.”

With those words, Bill Murray (in Lost in Translation) immortalized Suntory whiskey, a brand that few had heard in the U.S. and even fewer had actually tasted. Japanese single malt whisky? When it comes to alcohol, wasn’t Japan all about beer, plum wine, and sake?

In truth, Yamazaki has been distilling whisky near Kyoto since 1923. There are actual about 10 whisky distilleries in Japan, but Yamazaki was the first. Japanese whisky is made in a variety of styles, and production methods vary widely (unlike, say, in Scotland, which is very similar from distillery to distillery).

The flavor of Yamazaki 12 year, at 86 proof, is powerful. Many compare Japanese single malts to Scotch, but I find this one much more like a good, strong Irish whisky: It’s got that indescribably taste of malt but lacks the smokiness of Scotch. The Yamazaki is very bold, and with the first whiff the aroma of fresh fruit — apples and berries, some banana — washes over you. It’s got a nice sweetness to it, honey-like, almost with a candied orange character. There’s some pleasant heat to the finish but it’s mellowed by wood, though it can end up the slightest bit thin.

It’s fine on its own, better with a splash of water, and good on the rocks, too. (In Japan, whisky is mainly drunk with lots of water and lots of ice.)

If you’re a fan of either Scotch or Irish whisky, give Suntory a try. Try it blind against your favorites of those ilks and look for the differences. You’ll find them quite intriguing, I’m sure.

A- / $35 / suntory.com/yamazaki/

Alcademics’ Camper English made a cocktail inspired by bits of fallen houseplant… It’s not something I recommend you try, but it’s definitely worth the 20 seconds it’ll take you to read for sheer comedy value alone.

Organic tequila? Why not? Tequila (real, good tequila, anyway) is made entirely out of one plant, the agave, so if you can raise it organically, you’re pretty much making organic tequila. (Making an organic gin, say, with its myriad botanical ingredients, would be considerably more difficult.)

4 Copas (translation: “4 cups,” from a saying that holds if one shares four cups with friends, they will be friends for life) sent its three primary bottlings for our consideration. All are 100% agave, 80 proof, and certified organic. (Certified by whom, I’m not entirely sure.)

As always, we start with the lightest, 4 Copas Blanco, which is an excellent tequila all around. The taste of agave is present, but doesn’t overpower, rounding out with nice lemony sweetness that will be quite welcome by anyone who likes to suck on a lemon or lime after doing rotgut shots. Here you get citrus complexity without the training wheels, showing exactly how impressive a blanco can get. The finish is black pepper, but only a touch of alcoholic heat. I’m hard-pressed to name a better blanco on the market, but at these prices it better be good. Clearly some side-by-side tasting is required on my part in the near future. A / $57

4 Copas Reposado spends nine months in charred white oak, which mellows a tequila which really needs no mellowing. The reposado has a lot of the spirit of the blanco, but adding a touch of woodiness and a hint of honey and vanilla to it. It’s probably a question of taste, but I actually preferred the blanco by a slight margin, as the reposado’s wood covered up some of the characteristics I enjoyed in the silver. A- / $66

At $94 a bottle, 4 Copas Anejo is, to the best of my recollection, the most expensive tequila I’ve ever tasted. (Though 4 Copas also makes a Limited Edition Extra Anejo bottle that it sometimes sells for a whopping $1,000. Whoa.) Them’s some high expectations. Verdict: Again, very good stuff. A strong cognac character and heavy vanilla. Not sure how long this has been in barrels; I’m checking the the Copas folks. As good as the blanco, but not necessarily better. This is really what sipping tequila is all about. A / $94

If I have one complaint about 4 Copas it’s that the corks used to seal the bottles are really lousy. All three of them were cracked and tend to warp badly when I push them into the necks; each also left a serious amount of residue on the wide platform that serves as the opening for the bottle, some of which I’m sure made it into my glass or back into the bottle while I attempted to clean it off. I know shifting to something other than cork will never happen (all top tequilas use cork), but a redesign is clearly in order.

That said, I forgive all of this because the back side of each bottle has a hallucination-inducing engraving of a horse being ridden by a guy with an agave plant for a head. Oh, and the tequila tastes awesome.

4copas.com

Never a huge fan of Pinot Grigio, I’ve found Graffigna’s new release quite compelling as the varietal goes. Here’s a crisp and brisk wine, very citrusy (especially lemon, maybe some lime), with a bracing acidity. There’s Pinot Grigio’s telltale “meat” flavor in the finish, but, and it feels weird to type this, it works well with the citrus. The name may mislead you a bit. Graffigna isn’t from Italy but from another hemisphere altogether: Argentina. Who’d a thunk?

Most Pinot Grigio is thin and harsh, cheaply made in enormous quantities and exported for an American audience that probably now appreciates anything but Chardonnay. Check out this PG from south of the border if you can find it. While I can’t speak to how many cases Graffigna makes in a year, I can say that this is a light white wine that’s something different than you might be used to in what has become a pretty boring varietal. And the price is certainly right.

Oh… for what it’s worth, the company sent along this white Sangria recipe using this wine. I think it’s great on its own, but it could indeed make for a fine Sangria. If you try it let me know how it goes!

Sangria Blanca

1 bottle of Graffigna Pinot Grigio
1/4 cup triple sec
1/2 cup of sugar
1 cup of freshly squeezed orange juice
2 oranges cubed
2 apples cubed
6 cinnamon sticks
crushed ice
mint leaves
1 can sparkling water

Pour the bottle of Graffigna Pinot Grigio and triple sec into a ceramic pitcher. Stir in the sugar and juice. Add fruit and cinnamon sticks and stir again. Chill over night.

Add the soda, ice cubes and fresh mint leaves the next day 15 minutes prior to serving.

A- / $13 / graffignawines.com

First, terminology for the newbs: Blended malt Scotch lies between single malt and blended varieties. Single malt is made from malted barley from a single distillery. Blended Scotch is made from malt whiskey plus grain whiskey and can come from just about anywhere. (Blended Scotch is blended with the intent of making it consistent from year to year and, generally, more affordable.) Blended malt Scotch is comparably rare and lies between these two: It’s created by mixing single malt Scotches, with no addition of the cheaper grain alcohol to the blend, but the goal is to be as consistent as blended Scotch but having a more upscale taste. (To confuse matters further, blended malt is sometimes also called “pure malt” Scotch. Single malt purists prefer the original term of “vatted malt.”) In theory you can make your own blended malt at home by mixing up your favorite single malts just to see what happens.

Venerable blender Cutty Sark recently put out a blended malt bottling at 80 proof. This one, made of some 20 or so whiskys, isn’t bad at all. There’s smoke up front, then honey and vanilla. Some bits of citrus, then heat and plenty of it. The finish is a little thin as the taste wisps away. The flavors in the blend are all well and good, but there’s something about them that doesn’t quite work together. To use a terrible metaphor, it’s a bit like a layer cake, rather than a custard.

Cutty’s blended malt is perfectly drinkable (I know: I’ve been drinking it after dinner for three nights straight), but the nuance of many single malts that makes them so completely memorable seems curiously blended away. The decent price, however, makes this a somewhat compelling bottle for a Scotch. (It will, at least, when it makes it into wide release in the U.S.)

B / $30 / cutty-sark.co.uk

AskMen posted this manly cocktail list this week. Definitely can’t go wrong with using 100th anniversary Grand Marnier in a margarita, but the Guinness and champagne cocktail called the Black Velvet will test even the manliest drinkers’ palates, I fear. Check ‘em out and you be the judge on the manly factor here.

Don’t like coffee drinks? Don’t think tequila will work in one? Give this recipe a try (inspired by south-of-the-border spirits) and I absolutely guarantee your satisfaction.

Catalina Coffee
1 oz. premium silver (blanco) tequila
1/2 oz. Licor 43
1/4 oz. Damiana liqueur
1 sugar cube

Add above ingredients to a coffee mug, fill mostly with your favorite, piping hot coffee, and stir. Add cream, steamed milk, or whipped cream as desired. Top with a shake of cinnamon.

Want free wine? Enter the sweepstakes from Fleming’s restaurant, part of a promotion it’s running to celebrate a new by-the-glass wine list of 100 bottles. One lucky winner gets 100 bottles of wine and a wine fridge to put it all in.

Enter online before July 30. Winner selected July 31. You must be 21 or over and no, I have no idea how they’ll get the wine to you if you win.

Hangover remedies are legion (and of questionable utility), but the prepackaged variety has become considerably more popular in recent years. My own pre-sleep regimen of two Tylenol and a big glass of water seems to work pretty well, but is there a more “natural” way to do the job?

Hangover Buster is an Alka-Seltzer like tablet that you dissolve in water and drink after (or while) tying one on but before you call it a night. Drink it before bedtime and you’ll have no headache and no nausea come morning. What’s in the tablet? Lots of vitamins, bicarbonate, and a collection of miscellaneous additions including ginseng, caffeine, and white willow bark extract.

The flavor is lemon-lime but it’s really quite bittersweet. Combined with the effervescence I had trouble choking down a whole glass of this before bedtime. The caffeine also gave me pause. I don’t even drink bourbon and Coke after nine any more for fear it’ll keep me up. Having a shot right before bedtime didn’t seem too wise.

Fortunately, Hangover Buster didn’t keep me up any longer than normal, but it did seem to help in the morning after a longish night working the bottles. I find the taste too harsh, though, and I haven’t returned to the stuff, but that’s subjective: My wife doesn’t mind the taste at all and says the fizzy stuff works great for her. Would a vitamin pill, a Tums, and a ginger ale work just as well? (And cost less than $2 a dose?) Well, that’s an experiment for another day.

See also: Cheerz IntelliShot

B / $6 for a box of three tablets / hangoverbuster.com

The good folks at Gallo Family Vineyards (see prior review here) were kind enough to send along a four-pack of mini-bottles of Twin Valley Chardonnay, a non-vintage white that’s as close to a “picnic wine” as you’re likely to find.

Like “summer wine,” the “picnic wine” term comes loaded with baggage. It implies an easy-drinking, unchallenging wine that will go with ham sandwiches, fried chicken, potato salad, or whatever else you’ve got in the pic-a-nick basket. Twin Valley doesn’t really disappoint on this front. It’s a very simple and easy to drink wine, made even simpler by the pint-sized presentation and lack of a cork. The flavor is reminiscent of grape, apple, and some peach/apricot notes, but it honestly doesn’t taste much different than any very young, lightly oaked Chardonnay you’ve ever had. If you want nuance, try elsewhere.

If you’ve got a big picnic ahead, the wine’s also available in standard 750ml bottles (you can find it for 5 bucks) and 1.5 liter big ‘uns (you can find it for 6), too. But there’s just something satisfying about dumping the entire contents of a bottle of wine into a glass and downing it in one sitting. Take it from me: That’s hard to do with a regular bottle.

B- / $6 for four 187ml bottles / ejgtwinvalley.com