It’s almost like doing a shot of Novocain.
Don’t worry, we didn’t get rid of Libations in favor of a dentist review. The buzz button garnishing Jing’s Drunken Samurai is supposed to make your tongue and cheeks all tingly like you’re about to get some teeth work done. Talk about mouth feel.
I had always thought a buzz button was a “Jeopardy!”-esque tab that you press to immediately feel inebriated, sort of like a condensed Four Loko. In actuality, it is a little yellow bud that causes flashes of numbness in your mouth, which somehow makes you salivate and enlivens your senses.
Crafted with Ki No Bi gin and St. Germain lime juice, topped with a brown sugar salted rim and garnished with pickled ginger and a buzz button, the Drunken Samurai perks up any of Jing’s dishes from Colorado rolls to the branzino.
You may think that numbness would dull the tastes of your food and drink, but the salivation that follows awakens the sweet-and-savory ginger and brown sugar overtones and heightens the flavors, which makes you feel like you’re strolling beneath a row of cherry blossoms.
A literal drunken samurai may not be overly useful in battle or for courting geishas or whatever they did in the medieval ages, but Jing’s version might make you bold enough to do either — or to go get a filling, at least.