While it may be an acquired taste in any other part of the world, the mixture of Turkish Pepper (a very strong licorice variant) and strong spirits is well known and enjoyed throughout Scandinavia being the staple of many a disastrous drinking sessions. We started making our own mixes of this a few years ago and passing it around at friends in parties and festivals until someone who will be known as “Mr. Davies” came up with the designation “Satan’s Semen”. From there, the idea of asking designer friends and collaborators to come up with label designs was a natural step.
The recipe is quite simple really. Just mix the contents of 180 g bag of extra-hot Turkish Pepper candy with the contents of a bottle of cheap (but not too cheap) vodka until complete dissolution. The result is a black liquid, highly alcoholic but sweet and salty at the same time with a hot kick to it. Chill if possible and shake well before serving.
Getting the proportions right can be tricky and it does leave a lot on individual taste. Too much candy and the resulting mixture will be sickly syrupy sweet; while too much vodka will just yield black colored vodka with barely any salmiakki ‘punch’. Our rule of thumb is 1 small bag minus 10-12 candies with 75 cl of vodka. Do the maths for other proportions.
There are a couple of known (and tried) variations:
– “Hellfire Hot”, using Ukrainian Honey Pepper Vodka
– unnamed Bison Vodka variant
– “Salmiakki Koskenkorva”, effectively ‘the original’ thing, made using traditional Finnish white spirits
Feel free to contact us (info[at]connexionbizarre[dot]net to submit further label designs.
Steph “Raisinlove” Dumais
Canada, September 2006
First used at Maschinenfest 2006
www.raisinlove.com
Javier IA / Gee-Oh-Dee
Spain, September 2006
First used at Maschinenfest 2006
www.beliomagazine.com
Joana Dias
Portugal, September 2007
First used at Maschinenfest 2007
joana(dot)g(dot)g(dot)dias(at)gmail(dot)com
David vander Merwe
South Africa, April 2009
First used at Elektroanschlag 10
digitalpropaganda(at)gmail(dot)com
Netsui Arts
U.S.A., May 2009
www.netsuiarts.com
— the name “Satan’s Semen” is public domain; all artwork is owned by the respective authors and published with permission, please contact them asking for republishing permission and higher resolution images.