Welcome to the Good Beer Hunting Collective podcast, the show where members of our team interview each other to get a behind-the-scenes look at some of our favorite articles. I’m Ashley Rodriguez, and I produce Good Beer Hunting's podcast.
I live in Chicago, and there’s this liquor—maybe some of you have heard of it—called Malört, which is made from wormwood. If you ask anyone in Chicago what their local spirit is, they’d point to Malört; they might even trick their out-of-town friends to take a straight shot of it when they come to visit. And everyone knows how hard it is to drink Malört. The bottle’s label quotes creator Carl Jeppson as saying: “My Malört is produced for that unique group of drinkers who disdain light flavor or neutral spirits.” It goes on: “It is not possible to forget our two-fisted liquor. The taste just lingers and lasts—seemingly forever. The first shot is hard to swallow! Perservere [sic]. Make it past two 'shock-glasses' and with the third you could be ours... forever.”
Some would say that this sentiment is a perfect encapsulation of the people of Chicago. Perhaps not for everyone on the first sip, but they grow on you with time. Others might find that comparison silly, but it’s interesting to figure out what a city’s chosen liquor says about its history and spirit (no pun intended).
In this episode of the GBH Collective, I interview Gray Chapman, a freelance writer and frequent GBH contributor. She’s launching a new series for us called Beer and a Shot, which will profile the relationship between bartenders, spirits, and their relationships to the cities they inhabit. In this ongoing series, made in partnership with Miller High Life, Gray will write about a different city and a different bartender every month, and will show how a place’s personality can be discerned through its choice of spirit—a couple ounces at a time.
This is Gray Chapman, GBH contributor. Listen in.