Upon the realization I’ve had the very good fortune to have consumed various alcoholic beverages with a wide range of pretty diverse people in a bunch of random places, I’ve been allowed to hijack this week’s Thirsty Thursday.
The recipe may be simple, but realize that sometimes in the oddest of places, everything just tastes a little clearer, and sometimes all the “fluff” in your drink just isn’t necessary. With that in mind, let’s trek to the tundra.
“Sok!” Alexei cried happily as the utility vehicle pulled up, fresh from the helicopter landing pad at the top of the bluff and brimming with the week’s supply shipment. It had been a drizzly, dreary, cold spring day on the Ponoi and the clouds were just lifting in advance of the evening meal. The guides were back from the river, still clad in their waders and Buffs, standing nearby to help shuffle the sundries into the small kitchen area. Stubborn, thick mud clung to our boots, creating rather comical slides as we hauled the groceries to the safety of the wooden-floored storage area.
I was slowly learning enough Russian to realize Alexei was shouting about juice, though how or why was a different matter. Food was carefully allotted week-to-week, and when he turned around, two cases packed with boxes of juice in his arms, I realized somehow we’d received double the orange juice shipment.
It would be lying to say there was not a minor moment of celebration.
Later that night, the shipment stored away, the Mi-8 flown back off to Murmansk, and the guests fed and set up into a jovial game of poker in the Big Tent, we pirated a few boxes of orange juice, a thermos of ice, and two bottles of Kalashnikov. The latter was the staff vodka, which—to my uneducated tastes—tasted better than the more expensive Russian Standard, reserved for guests only.
It was still mucky on the little dirt path between housing shacks, but we rejoiced in our tall rubber boots and the creation of Screwdrivers. Spring was well on its way, and at our little outpost above the Arctic Circle the sun refused to set, the light waning to an otherworldly pinkish-orange tint that can only be described as a photographer’s dream light. As the night shifted on, more staff joined, a few guests meandered out, and somehow the vodka bottles and juice multiplied. There was a nightclub-worthy dance off. A near fistfight. A voluminous pink wig that somehow came out of nowhere and made the rounds for photographs. And a lot of laughter.
And all because of a little extra juice and a whole lot of vodka.
The recipe, I rather hate to pen down, since it fluxed throughout the night as varying bottles and boxes of vodka and juice ran low. Suffice to say the original ratio of one-to-four vodka-juice did not last long, and when the juice ran out around 0100h, the vodka kept coming. If you are a bit less lethally inclined and don’t happen to be at an impromptu tundra party with a bunch of fishing guides, I’d recommend the following:
1 1/2 oz. good vodka
6 oz. orange juice
Mix over ice. Drink. Repeat.
Go catch fish.
