Ah, the power of the internets! Without them, how would I ever have discovered The Mixilator?
The Mixilator is hosted by The Internet Cocktail Database. It presents you with a form asking you to specify your cocktail variety, hour, strength, level of complexity, and special characteristics. It then returns with a recipe for a cocktail.
But, the recipe that is returned to you is not a pre-existing coctail from the CocktailDB. Oh no, it is much more wonderful than that! The Mixilator randomly generates your cocktail recipe using an algorithm based on the theories set out by David Embury in his 1948 book The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks.
We are indeed living in a new age of wonders!
But we who care about science are not satisfied with the algorithmic implementation of a theory. We are the reality-based community. We seek empirical data!
So, for my readers of legal drinking age*, I beseech you:
- Load up the Mixilator and enter your specifications.
- Hit the “Create your automatic cocktail button” (and ignore the annoying femmebot voice announcing the arrival of your cocktail).
- Keep hitting the “Have another like this one” button until the recipe contains only ingredients you have on hand (unless you really feel like letting the algorithm generate your shopping list).
- Mix the cocktail according to the instructions.
- Sample the cocktail.
- Collect your observations. Is it drinkable? Yummy? Does it conform to the specifications you entered?
Report your findings here, in the comments. Once we have enough data, we’ll work out whether Embury’s theory of cocktails (and/or this automatic implementation of them) holds up.
