Right now the Scriptures can date back to ancient Oaxaca, but there might have been some 2,000 drinks, if only I had the ingredients. Among the “Oaxaca” drinks alone we may have “flower,” “gold,” and “tail.” The barbeys promise about 50 takes on classic fashion, and more than 70 versions of the mule. (A third cocktail machine option, the BEV by Black + DECKER, uses Bartesian capsules in a different device design. It may have been discontinued according to reps, but it’s still available on Amazon.)
It’s all very funny, my friends assure me, when I send them barley crying for ingredients to enter the lower gland of the body that enters the icy, frothy whirlpool.
“I’m embarrassed to look at this,” wrote my editor in the thread.
“That’s so dumb,” the friend remarked, before adding, “you should definitely bring it.”
No one indeed it takes a machine to make a decent cocktail, of course. But you might want one. I have an idea, the kind of big idea you sometimes hear in small bars. The promise of an automatic cocktail machine doesn’t become convenient, or necessary, or even helpful. It is, instead, happiness. It’s delicious. Anything that will make today different from yesterday. It’s that dumb little thing that makes your neighbor happy to come over, gives people something to talk about at a holiday party, or keeps your partner entertained by leaning in after a date that can’t be found.
As the holiday season approaches, here’s how to choose between two flawed but fun machines. The devices that show the health they use.
Best for parties: Scripture 360
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Photo: Mathew Korfhage
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Photo: Mathew Korfhage
– Over there
- The machine delivers very accurate measurements by weight
- The phone app suggests any of 2,000 cocktails, depending on the ingredients
- Looks cool, right?
-Cobekele
- Cleaning, stocking, and changing ingredients is a lot of effort
- The app can be a little buggy, and difficult to navigate
- It’s a soft thing. Cleaning, too
Barbies 360 is a burning machine, literally. Choose your drink from the device’s phone app, and the machine will light up like a discotheque or a bowling alley. The bars pour out strong, aggressive squits – impressively accurate within three hundred – eight hundred.
As it pours your drink, the device’s lights will change from white to blue to green when your cocktail is ready. And if you’ve ever bought barges’ mixer glass ($45) with a magnetic spinner, the cup will quickly scoop up your drink, ice and all, as it scoops out your tropical diamori daiquiri. Whoopee! Shining, spinning drink!
We’re firmly in Party-Trick territory here. And the Lord, he is a fool. And it’s fun. And stupid. If you keep it on your kitchen counter, the device can cause you to make too many drinks because you can’t, and because you fill up the water reservoirs. This can be dangerous at night at work.
