Snake Bites banned in England

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ElevenBrewCo

ElevenBrewCo

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For all you that dont know what snake bites are. Its just a simple half and half. Usually half carlsburg and half strongbow(cider)....pretty much the equivilant to redbull and vodka in potent terms.

From my recent trip back to the mother land i tried to order one with no luck. Its known for well basically getting you abliterated super quick. So pubs finally caught on and were smart enough to ban it so they wouldnt have brawls as much. Since i was a local my bartender she was nice enough to sell me half pint of carlsburg and half pint of strongbow. I think if America caught onto this we would have problems. My dad and I usually drink at a irish pub and resturant and they actually created the snakebite on the menu just for me! My friend drank three pints of them, my pops warned him and needless to say, his new nickname is lightweight.

Just an FYI give it a try sometime!:mug:
 
The original snakebite was Guinness (or another stout) and cider, created as a poor man's black velvet. There's also a shot by the same name, which varies by region; 75% whiskey and 25% lime juice is the most common, but there are hundreds of variations.

A cider/stout (or carlsberg/cider) drink isn't actually all that strong; the strength of any half-and-half drink is always less than the strength of the stronger half (midway between that and the weaker half).

It's usually considered a sessionable low-ABV drink (if anything a little girly--not that I care, when you're in the right mood they're tasty!), not something that'll screw you up quickly.
 
Wow, this thread makes me question whether I ever want to leave Wisconsin or not. In Texas they called a 6-pack a "case" (and seemed to think it was a lot of beer) and in Ohio they had no idea what bitters were or how to make a Whiskey Old Fashioned. I have heard tale that some states limit the number of drinks you can order in an hour.. and don't even get me started on that whole 4-loko thing! So college kids got alcohol poisoning? Boohoo, at UW Madison we called that Friday night.

Rant and/or rave.. Other places are strange ;-)
 
I'm there with you tipfeister. What do they call a box with 24 bottles in it? I hear it's real hard to find Brandy outside Wisconsin too. And.....I thought Thursday night was the night for house parties in Mad Town.
 
crabbypatty said:
For all you that dont know what snake bites are. Its just a simple half and half. Usually half carlsburg and half strongbow(cider)....pretty much the equivilant to redbull and vodka in potent terms...

My dad and I usually drink at a irish pub and resturant and they actually created the snakebite on the menu just for me! My friend drank three pints of them, my pops warned him and needless to say, his new nickname is lightweight.

Just an FYI give it a try sometime!:mug:
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I'll give it a try with some of my homemade cider sometime.

But like SumnerH I am a little confused. Draft Strongbow in the UK is 4.5% ABV, and Carlsberg Lager is about 4%. So you'd end up with a 4.25% pint if you mixed equally, with none of the "energy" components or caffeine of a Red Bull and Vodka.
 
I've ordered a snakebite in 5 different states and all have come the same way, half Harp and half cider. The states I've ordered these in are North Carolina, Virginia, Florida, Tennessee, and Kentucky. Maybe this is the southern way of making them?
 
tjpfeister said:
Wow, this thread makes me question whether I ever want to leave Wisconsin or not. In Texas they called a 6-pack a "case" (and seemed to think it was a lot of beer) and in Ohio they had no idea what bitters were or how to make a Whiskey Old Fashioned.
Click to expand...

I've lived in Texas since I was 3 and I have never heard a six pack referred to as a case. A case is a twelve pack. It can also be used generically for any box of canned beer, soda, etc. as well.

I'm sure some bars in Ohio know what an old fashioned is, but like in Texas you probably have to go to more upscale bars where the bartenders know how to make mixed drinks beyond rum and coke and cosmos.
 
Yep, I've always known of the UK version of snakebite as half lager, half cider (the exact brands can vary). I've had more than quite a few of them (having drunk many, many of them over the years since first being introduced by a bunch of Irish cats I used to work with over a decade ago)...actually just had a couple over the last few days, since I just bottled my annual cider from this past fall.

There's definitely nothing about the ABV that is different from any session beer, but for some odd reason, I've definitely found (having drunk many, many of them over the years since first being introduced by a bunch of Irish cats I used to work with over a decade ago) that the buzz is slightly different. I have no idea why, but it's definitely different...not fall down drunk or get drunk fast like drinking liquor after beer, but just "different."

It still makes no sense to ban it...
 
tjpfeister said:
Wow, this thread makes me question whether I ever want to leave Wisconsin or not. In Texas they called a 6-pack a "case" (and seemed to think it was a lot of beer) and in Ohio they had no idea what bitters were or how to make a Whiskey Old Fashioned. I have heard tale that some states limit the number of drinks you can order in an hour.. and don't even get me started on that whole 4-loko thing! So college kids got alcohol poisoning? Boohoo, at UW Madison we called that Friday night.

Rant and/or rave.. Other places are strange ;-)
Click to expand...

and you can't even play bar dice!
 
ReverseApacheMaster said:
I've lived in Texas since I was 3 and I have never heard a six pack referred to as a case. A case is a twelve pack. It can also be used generically for any box of canned beer, soda, etc. as well.
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In the rest of the US, it's generally a 24-pack.

Hence the old saying "24 hours in a day--24 beers in a case...coincidence?"
 
Haha!
I didn't mean to stir up a beehive. I admit, the sample size of my study was considerably small. I just couldn't imagine living anywhere that doesn't take binge drinking seriously ;-)
 
SumnerH said:
In the rest of the US, it's generally a 24-pack.

Hence the old saying "24 hours in a day--24 beers in a case...coincidence?"
Click to expand...

We are lax about our language. "Coke" is our term for any kind of soda...

I guess you are right that a 24 pack is properly a case but I don't recall seeing a 12 pack sold as a "half case" anywhere around the state.
 
I've had the poor mans Black Velvet before with Guinness and Cider and the only thing dangerous about it was how easy it was to put away. Certainly wouldn't get you messed up.
 
Laughing_Gnome_Invisible said:
It doesn't sound like a ban, just certain landlords manipulating the kind of clientele they attract by adjusting their services. Kinda like choosing whether they have strippers or not.
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You're bang on with that there LGI, it's not a ban, it's landlords choosing not to serve a drink which is more than the sum of its two parts and causes a lot of trouble.

Snakebite is very easy to drink and goes down like alcopop, but a lot of ciders are closer to 5-6% and people drink it too fast and get bladdered and start shadow boxing.

I've served a lot of them, I've also never heard of cider and guinness as a snakebite.

What you do sometimes get which makes it go down even easier is a snakebite with a shot of blackcurrant cordial in it, making it a snakebite and black or a diesel depending on what part of Ireland or the UK you get it in.
 
I only know snakebites as a stout and cider over here in CA. Yes there good but I couldn't imagine drinking enough to get that wasted I think I would puke first from all the cider.
 
the OP's snake bite doesnt sound anything like red bull and vodka.

when mixing energy drinks (lots of caffeine) with alcohol you mix uppers and downers so you can drink more without passing out so you get even more drunk and closer to the danger threshold without feeling it as much as you would without the caffeine.

its basically like drinking and going out in the cold. youre flush with blood so you feel warm but truely you cant feel how cold your core is so you dont know how close to hypothermia you are.
 
Asked my British wife about snakebites, and she said that her parents and their friends were always drinking them when she was growing up. She described it as cider-lager with a dash of blackcurrant cordial. She agreed that the ABV wasn't high, but did agree that somehow people seemed to get legless faster on it. Maybe because it goes down so smoothly?
 
Funny how one shot can differ....here in Winnipeg its half Jack Daniels and tequila.
 
Here in CA its usually guinness and cider (some places use pear cider). I've only had it once, it's alright I prefer black and tan's with guinness and SN.

CTS: lol, reminds me of the "Four Horsemen" jack, johnnie, jim and jameson.
 
dvdanny said:
Here in CA its usually guinness and cider (some places use pear cider). I've only had it once, it's alright I prefer black and tan's with guinness and SN.

CTS: lol, reminds me of the "Four Horsemen" jack, johnnie, jim and jameson.
Click to expand...

Four Horsemen around here is Jack, Johnnie, Jim, and Jose.

Jack, Johnnie, and Jim alone is a Three Wise Men.
 
I live in Texas and I've never heard of a 6 pack or a 12 pack referred to as a case. A case is 24 beers. Period. Now there are some towns where you can get a cube of beer, 30 cans.
And any half decent bar from Houston to Dallas to Austin/San Antonio, all the way down to Corpus Christi should know a snakebite beer is half stout/ half cider. I've ordered them in at least 3 bars in each city.
 
In my neck of the woods a snakebite is also called a black apple. Strongbow and Guinness is what is usually poored.

I think people can get drunk on them quick because they go down so easy you might tend to drink a lot of them in a short amount of time.

I have always referred to these drinks as "panty droppers".
 
tjpfeister said:
Wow, this thread makes me question whether I ever want to leave Wisconsin or not. In Texas they called a 6-pack a "case" (and seemed to think it was a lot of beer) and in Ohio they had no idea what bitters were or how to make a Whiskey Old Fashioned. I have heard tale that some states limit the number of drinks you can order in an hour.. and don't even get me started on that whole 4-loko thing! So college kids got alcohol poisoning? Boohoo, at UW Madison we called that Friday night.

Rant and/or rave.. Other places are strange ;-)
Click to expand...

Hear hear! :tank:
 

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