Jagermeister.jpgWhile at dinner at The Mews Tavern (the best place this side of purgatory) last week with some newlywed friends [conrad’s again Pat and Jill Austin] -- Jill asked me very specifically “What is Jägermeister?”

Jill knew of Jägermeister, she has seen its troubling effects warp the minds of her friends many times before, but her question was absolutely valid. Was it a form of Rum, Schnapps or other class of liquor? What is in it? Why did we like to enjoy it so often?

I thought for a minute and the only information I could give her was that it was liquid ‘awesome’ somehow captured in a green bottle served cold and I rambled something incoherent about deer’s blood as I drank my 18th beer.

I decided right then and there that I did not know enough about the Green she-devil which consumes me (contrary to popular belief that you consume it) for so much of my life.

Let’s start at what we know about Jägermeister

  • Jägermeister is German.
  • Jäger bottles are green.
  • Jäger when consumed in correct amounts (lots) can induce uncontrollable time travel.
  • A Jäger-buzz is a combination of Crack-Addict hyper, Tequila stumbles and Idiotic-rage.
  • Jäger cannot be consumed warm or even just a little chilled -- it must be exactly one degree above freezing.
  • Jäger can easily make 350lb. grown men drop to their knees and cry in minutes.
  • Jägerbombs are fucking awesome.

After a quick visit to the Jägermeister English website we find out that they only provide you with some sort of retarded folklore babble about two men, a deer and a jar of mustard. The German site is much more in-depth .. but I don’t understand German -- so time to Google.

After a minute of web searching I find out that there are way too many low-budget drink recipe sites on the internet. Their numbers are close to rivaling the “free font/free clipart” genre of annoying abandoned websites.

After some advanced Googleing (I think I made that word up) we find out that the word Jägermeister loosely translated from German means “Master Hunter” which I instantly thought to myself “isn’t that quite fitting -– poison arrows would probably have the same effect on people as a few shots of Jäger”

Upon further searching we find out that Jägermeister is a 70-proof spirit which contains 56 herbs, roots, and spices. Jägermeister is also stored in oak barrels for a period of time no less than one year before bottling. At the end of this storage time, the extract is filtered once more, mixed with liquid sugar, caramel, alcohol, and water, and filtered yet again. The resultant brew is then ready for bottling.

A quick trip to snoops.com we find out that Jägermeister contains no deer or elk’s blood and never has. This rumor was probably created by drunkards trying to explain the animal like rage that Jägermeister is known to produce. (I checked – red bull also contains no by product of any animal)

I have done way too much thinking about Jägermeister for a Wednesday morning.