Well, my days of adventure are over with the Honolulu Police Department.  Unable to adequately perform the Vascular Neck Restraint in a Control and Arrest Tactics practical exam, I was cut from the program.  

Boo hoo.

In celebration of this inadvertant victory over my own stupidity in career choice, I have been drinking and eating a lot this past week.  Here’s a run down of my recent Japadamus related experiences (I can only think of two at the moment):

1. Harpo’s Thai Marinade/Dressing:

 I started using this when I first came to Hawaii, a pale, poor, and pretentious law student, too good to even attempt a Spam Musubi.  I use the verb “using” because this marinade is more like a drug than food.  But unlike most drugs, which have an opposite effect, this one makes you very, very fat. 

I put this on grilled chicken over white and brown rice (mixed).  That’s it.  It’s really freakin’ good though.  It also has 150 calories per serving.  130 of those are from fat.  I went down three belt sizes while at the Academy; one week and one bottle of this stuff later, I’m back to where I started.  Rock on spicy peanuts!

2.  Suntory Single Malt Whisky “Yamazaki” 18 year:

I promised I would try a Japanese whisky and give a review.  I actually bought this months ago, but only this week finished off the bottle.  (There’s nothing like raiding Karazhan while drunk on Japanese whisky while yelling “Fucka RYU!” over Ventrilo.  If you understood that last sentence, congrats!, you’re a fuckin’ nerd too.)

There’s really only one thing I can say about this whisky:

It smells like bananas.

I’m not kidding; you open the bottle, pour a glass, and it smells like fake banana flavoring.  Like the banana pieces in a bag of Runts. 

It doesn’t, however, taste like bananas.  “It tastes like burning”, to quothe the poet Ralph.  It has a weak flavor, but an unusual spicyness.  Is that word spelled with an “i” in the middle?  The spiciness (don’t like the way that looks, we’re going back to the “y”) lingers for a while after a sip.  I’m pretty sure that rice is used somewhere in the crafting process of this whisky, it’s too smooth, almost vodka-like, in it’s flavor.  I like to spell that word with a “u”.  Flavour. 

So it’s not really bad.  In fact, unlike most whiskies, I could probably drink this whole bottle in one sitting and it wouldn’t make my stomach explode.  I used to be able to do that with Jack Daniels, but I’m too old and delicate for that now.  But, at the same time, because I’m looking for a high quality in a small quantity, I wouldn’t pick this whisky.  Maybe it’s because I’ve also discovered islay scotch, but I wants me some peaty, smoky flavour in my beverage. 

So what I’m saying is that if high quality single malt whiskies aged for more than 16 years are types of Biscotti:  Suntory is Pocky.  I can eat a box of it, but I’m not really sure why I would.  And I’m not really sure what it’s made out of, but it’s certainly not traditional.  Or necessarily even food.

On the upside, I can honestly say that this is the only whisky I would ever try to eat with sushi.

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