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I have watched Prosecco pull off one of the great disappearing acts in modern wine: it became the most consumed sparkling wine on earth without most drinkers ever learning to pronounce Valdobbiadene... The delicious Tongue Dancer Wines The Sly One Pinot Noir Russian River Valley 2024 is our Beverage of the Week. The Knickerbocker is our Cocktail of the Week. We also feature The BevX Top Six Rum Cocktails, Gamay — Underestimate it at Your Peril, and Kölsch — Cologne’s Incomporable Beer. As always, we offer a selection of new reviews, and don’t forget about Be A Beverage Expert — the ideal guide for all BevXers.
Beverage of the Week
We are happy to introduce Tongue Dancer Wines (TDW )'s sixth vintage of its “The Sly One” (TSO) Pinot Noir. The Sly One has earned its nickname this vintage as veteran BevXers and long-time fans of TDW associate the Pratt Vine Hill Vineyard with Chardonnay. Clearly, this vineyard is also home to some fancy Mt. Eden clone Pinot Noir...
BevX Insider
Gen Z's Drinking Problem Isn't Attitude. It's Opportunity.
The industry has spent two years reassuring itself that Gen Z's sobriety reputation was overblown, and the data backs that up — IWSR now puts their drinking participation at 74 percent, nearly matching the overall adult rate. If the story were really about changing attitudes toward alcohol, that recovery should be the end of it.
It isn't, because the real threat was never attitude. According to American Time Use Survey data, one in ten Americans aged 23 to 29 spent zero minutes in face-to-face interaction with another person on an average day in 2023. That's not a rounding error — it's a meaningful slice of exactly the cohort the alcohol industry needs to recruit into bars, parties, and shared drinking occasions. You cannot market your way around a customer who isn't leaving the house.
This distinction matters because it changes what "winning back" Gen Z actually requires. A better bottle, a smarter ad campaign, or a friendlier price point does nothing for someone who has no social occasion to bring it to. The isolation didn't start with the pandemic, but pandemic-era disruption pushed an already-isolated subset of young adults into a pattern many haven't recovered from — while their more socially connected peers largely bounced back.
Alcohol has always depended on shared human contact to matter. For a growing share of young adults, that contact simply isn't happening — no matter how the industry chooses to talk about drinking. What clever brand can encourage Gen Z to connect with their inner human and embrace human contact and genuine interactions?
Cocktail of the Week
This classic cocktail is among the oldest drinks documented in English print in the mid-1880s. The term Knickerbocker is an old nickname for New Yorkers of Dutch heritage, popularized by Washington Irving’s satirical 1809 book A History of New York. The exact origins of the drink are much debated...
This Week’s Features
Beyond the Spritz: A Real Guide to Prosecco
I have watched Prosecco pull off one of the great disappearing acts in modern wine: it became the most consumed sparkling wine on earth without most drinkers ever learning to pronounce Valdobbiadene...
The BevX Top Six Rum Cocktails
Rum is not one spirit — it’s dozens of them wearing the same name. It ranges from crystal-clear White Rum to rich, dark, barrel-aged expressions. When making Rum Cocktails, the first thing to consider is the Rum...
Gamay — Underestimate it at Your Peril
If Gamay were a literary or cinematic character, it would command a fierce cult following. Slandered, misunderstood, typecast in roles beneath its gifts, and even a victim of identity theft, this grape has spent centuries living in the shadow of more celebrated relatives...
Kölsch — Cologne’s Incomporable Beer
Kölsch is a style of beer just waiting to be discovered by the masses (the Germans have known this for some time). It has the appearance and drinkability of a lager, the aromatics of an ale, and the refreshing qualities of Prosecco. In short, it’s hard to have just one Kölsch...
This Week's Reviews
We have had an exciting and busy week of swirling and tasting. This week we offer four new spirits reviews (Three Featured Calvados) and two new wine reviews! Dig in.
Be A Beverage Expert (BABE)
Be a Beverage Expert is a celebration of curiosity about beverages, combining history, culture, and practical insights. It’s a superb reference, and it makes a great gift.
It's Here: Pique's New Caffeine-Free Afternoon Energy
I quit my afternoon coffee. Not because I wanted to — because I found something better.
You know that wall you hit every day around 2–3 PM? I used to just accept it as the cost of doing anything. Another coffee, a quick spike, then the crash — and somehow I'd still feel dehydrated by dinner.
Then I tried X·E Fountain, Pique's brand-new electrolyte energy drink, and I genuinely wasn't ready for how good "no crash" could feel.
No caffeine jitters. No 4 PM slump. Just clean, steady energy that actually hydrates me instead of draining me. It's built with a premium Vitamin B Complex for natural cellular energy, Magnesium Malate + Taurate for real focus, and a full electrolyte blend that makes it feel like a treat, not a chore.
The cucumber-celery-lime flavor is so crisp and refreshing — it's basically stolen my afternoon coffee slot completely.
A Final Note
Today’s thought…
“The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.” — Marcus Aurelius
Until next time,
STAY THIRSTY BEVXERS.
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