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Patio Drinking: Kalimotxo
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Patio Drinking: Kalimotxo
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For the inaugural edition of our seasonal special, Patio Drinking, we cross the Atlantic to bring you a warm-weather intoxicant straight from the plazas of sunny Spain: kalimotxo.
Kalimotxo (Basque) or calimocho (Catalan) is a fifty-fifty blend of cheap red wine and Coca-Cola, served over plenty of ice in a short glass tumbler.� The mixture is also often drunk out of plastic bottles called minis, katxi, macetas, litros, cubalitros or jarras.� The kalimotxo is made by pouring out half of a liter bottle of cola and pouring in the red wine.� These minis can then be shared by drinkers, usually Spanish teenagers, at botell�nes -- outdoor parties in public spaces.
The sweet potion is said to have originated at a 1972 summer festival in Algorta, Spain, when some young vendors realized "the wine they had planned to sell tasted not just bad but toxic, and added Coca-Cola and ice to mask the flavor," writes Jonathan Miles in a 2007 New York Times article. "It was an improbable hit."
The type of wine used to make kalimotxo falls at the low end of even a teenager's booze budget.� Indeed, Miles hits it on the head with his grape juice recommendation: " if you wish to follow botell�n tradition, harsh and cheap. The kind of wine that begs for a little helping hand."
Since Coca-Cola is about as sweet as a beverage can be, stick with dry reds with a little tannic bite for best results.� The big, 1500 ml. bottle of� Bolla Sangiovese is $15.99 at PLCB stores -- enought to make a few minis for you and all your best underage chums.
It's delicious and dangerous. I recommend giving it a try. I was visiting my brother, who was studying abroad in Madrid, a few years back and his buddies mixed it up at a party. I turned up my nose and waited until I was a few drinks in to taste the kalimoxto. Why did I wait??? So good! Cut to me dancing like Eurotrash all night in the club, stumbling back to the university housing in the wee hours, and eating all the white bread and peanut butter my mom sent in a care package. I was at a wedding last year where we decided to mix some up and it turns out this is a popular concoction in Romania, too.
Good drinking-abroad story! I have a similar one that starts with a Roman bar crawl and ends with me sleeping on a bridge. Americans in Europe are so chic! Wiki says calimocho is popular in scads of places: "In Chile the drink is known as jote (Chilean Spanish for the Black Vulture), and in Serbia, the Republic of Macedonia, Croatia and other former Yugoslav republics of it is known as bambus (meaning bamboo). In the Czech Republic it is known as houba, and in Hungary as Vadász (meaning hunter) or vörösboros kóla." My sister was the one who told me about calimocho/kalimotxo after she had it in France.
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