Reviewers celebrate St. Patty’s with a selection of green sips

Happy St. Patty’s Day to you all, and we hope your weekends were safe and fun. Ours sure were, as we sampled different holiday inspired beverages with a common theme: green. The first beverage we took note of was the abundance of BORGs around St. Joe. While we are unsure of what BORG truly stands for, we are sure of this: It consists of vodka, water, a flavoring like MIO and green food coloring. The taste of these bad boys wasn’t special; they’re essentially a bad-flavored water with an aftertaste you’d love to forget. However, the BORG names were what drew us to try these mediocre beverages.

They ranged from classics like LeBorg James and Borgan Freeman to unique names like Hire MasonBorg. (Mason is a computer science major and global business leadership minor with an incredible work ethic, looking for employment opportunities in the greater Twin Cities Area.) Chach’s personal favorite was brought to him by former beer reviewer Spangy Wangy’s twin brother, Spangy Wangy. His BORG highlighted Minnesotan history, pop culture and swag all within an epic name: Borgan Lightfoot. This tribute to a phenomenal singer songwriter prompted impromptu sing-alongs to the all-time great song, “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.”

Our next festive taste was the mystery green beer the La was serving. We didn’t know what to expect because, as some of you may know, beer is not usually green. With the green coloring, we thought the possibility of a green apple or possibly lime flavor was a realistic outcome… boy were we bummed. The only thing that saved our day from true heartbreak was the pickles we placed in our normal-tasting beers. Per usual, the live music was spectacular, but we still left disappointed, similar to how Vikings fans feel every year after their team falls short yet again. There is always next year… right?

Margaritas, a classic green sipper, while not Irish in any way, were still a special treat on St. Patrick’s Day weekend. We ventured next door to another local location, Tacoholic, to try their smooth tequila mixed with lime and triple sec (which we had no idea was in a margarita… we are beer boys). Thankfully, after a full afternoon our “Margs” mellowed us out as Saturday evening came upon us. Something about lime truly makes every drink better, whether it’s a beer or cocktail, a fresh green lime in your drink makes all your troubles melt away. In our newly heightened mood, all we could think of while drinking this was the TikTok-famous song lyrics, “Gimme one Margarita, imma…” not drink the whole thing because at CSB+SJU we are responsible 21+ drinkers and always Stop at Buzzed.

Smirnoff Ice Green Apple unfortunately rounded out our evening. After finding this sucker tucked away in the back of the fridge, it almost felt as though we had ‘iced’ ourselves (a reference our younger 21+ audience will understand). We took turns taking swigs of the Ice, and to no one’s surprise, our mouths puckered afterwards. You know that scene in Dumb and Dumber when the cop takes a swig of the beer bottle that has pee in it, then makes that puckering/clicking sound? We guarantee Smirnoff Ice Green Apple was actually in that bottle to get the reaction the director was looking for. Sour, icky, yet sugar filled and horrible for your tummy, this drink was a true loser with no upside at all.