Chocolate And Booze Finally Hook Up
I've long been fascinated by inventors who were able to enhance a very cool and useful thing that already existed simply by adding another existing thing to it.
Visionaries like Hymen Lipman, who received the first patent for attaching an eraser to the end of a pencil. And Dr. Spencer Silver, who took an ordinary piece of paper, slapped a re-adherable strip of adhesive on the back and called it a Post-it.
Men the world over owe a huge debt of gratitude to reproductive physiologist Gregory Pincus for figuring out that women are a whole lot more fun to be around when combined with a pill that inhibits fertility.
And, of course, big ups to whoever the genius was who saw laser lights and thought, "you know what would make the emission of electromagnetic radiation through a process of optical amplification even cooler? A Led Zeppelin concert and some blotter acid!"
Well, you can add another name to that prestigious list, my friends. And that name is Craig Boreth, whose exciting new venture is poised to forever change the way intemperate adults enjoy confections.
It seems Boreth was sitting around his house one day last year watching C-SPAN, eating Hershey bars and barking obscenities at the Republicans who wanted to take away his unemployment checks, when it dawned on him that the chocolate he was bingeing on to cope with depression might be more effective if it were filled with booze.
So he holed up in his kitchen for a few weeks with truffles and several bottles of top shelf spirits and – voila! – Twice the Vice was born!
"None of that stuff you wrote about how I started the company is true," said Boreth, when I called him just now to fact check this post/hit him up for more free samples of the fortified sweets. "I've never been depressed, and I was actually was making a decent living as a writer when I came up with the idea for Twice the Vice."
Whatever, man.
Boreth, who claims to have written the books How to Feel Manly in a Minivan and The Hemingway Cookbook among others, said Twice the Vice is the result of a desire to combine two of his favorite gustatory delights. While he's not the first person to mix alcohol and chocolate, having tasted his wares I'm willing to wager that nobody has ever done it better.
He makes all of the products in the Twice the Vice line himself, and though he has had no professional culinary training, he's been a serious foodie for years and knows his way around a kitchen.
Boreth infuses the chocolate ganache with a lineup of hooch that would make any seriously discerning drinker's tongue wag. The single-malt Scotches include Macallan 12, Glenlivet 15, Lagavulin 16 and Tomatin 18. If bourbon's your poison, there's Knob Creek, Eagle Rare and Elijah Craig to choose from. Tequila fans get 901 blanco, El Diamante reposado and rare 7 Leguas anejo.
Best of all, Twice the Vice offers the perfect gift for the hard-to-buy-for amiable stoner on your Christmas list. Guys (like me) whose idea of heaven is an employment-free existence replete with an endless supply of medically-necessary marijuana, a comfy terrycloth robe, and "The Big Lebowski" playing on perpetual loop: The "Helluva Caucasian" collection of White Russian truffles features packaging by Lebowski Fest poster designer Bill Green.
Dude, how awesome is that?
Okay, I've had a few too many booze-filled chocolates, and the rumbling in my tummy is telling me it's time to go create something new by combining two things that already exist: my ass and the toilet seat.
The end result may not turn out to be as important as the Post-it, but like a great man once said, hey, at least I'm housebroken.
For more on Twice the Vice visit TwicetheVice.com. Hear Craig Boreth on the latest installment of The Imbiber Show podcast