Modern Living: Cows with a Kick

During Prohibition, indiscriminate tipplers discovered that whisky could be downed with impunity in public places if it were concealed in a glass of milk. A few learned to like it that way and kept the habit after repeal, continuing to order an occasional brandy alexander (cream, brandy and creme de cacao) or a sombrero (milk and Kahlua). But now drinkers are turning in larger numbers to the milky way. Liquor-store shelves are displaying a growing variety of dairy-based, premixed cocktails combining booze and moos.

The new drinks taste something like a milkshake with a kick. Only 30 proof, they are aimed primarily at drinkers who dislike the taste of alcohol but enjoy its effects. To further camouflage the liquor taste, generous doses of chocolate, banana, strawberry and other flavorings are added. Federal Distillers in Cambridge, Mass., the first liquor company to go into bovine beverages, has a special Ice Box line that includes such cool, hot sellers as premixed Chocolate Sombreros (creme de cacao with a dairy base), and a Chocolate Chaser (creme de cacao and eggnog). Glenmore Distilleries in Louisville calls its creamy spirits Snowshakes. Chicago’s Consolidated Distilled Products is milking the new fad by marketing Aberdeen Cows, which come in unusual flavors such as coconut and walnut. Prices range from about $2.50 to $4 a fifth.

Sweet Appeal. Among leaders of the herd are Malcolm Hereford’s Cows, produced by Heublein, Inc., which began test-marketing the product last spring. More than 500,000 cases have been sold so far, and liquor stores report that the Cows are a live stock indeed. Heublein’s ads show Cow bottles grazing in a green pasture and describe how Malcolm Hereford, a fictitious bull breeder, invented the drink. Concludes Hereford: “A Cow-on-the-rocks is not a bum steer.”

Cow sales on Continental Airlines took off as soon as the Cows were added to its beverage list, and the airline is now selling special $1 “cow chips”—ersatz gold tokens, embellished with a cow, good for three drinks. Continental’s thirstiest “Cowboys” seem to be women —and college students of both sexes. Explains Stewardess Becky Schnehl: “Maybe it’s a carryover from their milkshake days. The sweetness appeals, and so does the fact that they usually can’t taste the alcohol in it.” Elaine Drakos, a teacher from Huntington, Long Island, has found another virtue in Cows. Says she: “They’re great on cereal.”