Blow My Skull, or Blow My Skull Off

Blow My Skull, or Blow My Skull Off , is a drink from the early colonial period of Australia’s history—or, rather, it is a pair of drinks connected by nothing more than a common name, one that undoubtedly must be parsed, in consideration of their formulae, as a wish.

Blow My Skull I, if we may call it that, was the brainchild of Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Davey (1758–1823), lieutenant governor of Van Diemen’s Land (as Tasmania was then known) from 1813 to 1817. According to Edward Abbott (1801–1869), an eccentric Tasmanian landowner, legislator, and bon viveur who published the first Australian cookbook in 1864, Davey had a peculiar procedure when he held session. He would have a wattle hut erected out in the bush and sit therein behind a table bearing a barbecued pig. At his right hand would be a cask of his Blow My Skull, a punch containing rum, brandy (or, by another account, whisky), porter, citrus juice, sugar, and water. When a petitioner approached, he would receive a large tumbler of Blow My Skull, and he and Davey would drink, not stopping until their tumblers were empty. “The governor having an impenetrable cranium, and an iron frame,” as Abbott recalled, he “could take several goblets of the alcoholic fluid, and walk away as lithe and happy as possible.” His petitioners were seldom so fortunate. See punch.

Davey’s drink might have been strong, but it was not vicious. The same cannot be said for Blow My Skull II, or Blow My Skull Off. A drink of the first Australian gold rush in the early 1850s, it contained (as one observer claimed) “Cocculus indicus, spirits of wine, Turkey opium, Cayenne pepper, and rum.” Cocculus indicus and opium being stupefacients, even served diluted with five parts of water, as was the practice, this formula would have earned its name. By the end of the nineteenth century, Australia was fortunately beyond such intoxicants, and Blow My Skull would remain dormant until around 2000, when the influential mixographers Gary Regan and Mardee Haidin Regan came up with their (Almost) Blow My Skull Off, a tribute to the gold miners’ drink combining cognac, peach schnapps, and Jägermeister. There, for now, the story rests. See Regan, Gary.

Recipe (Davey’s Blow My Skull): Dissolve 180 g demerara sugar in 500 ml boiling water. Let cool; add 180 ml lime or lemon juice, 500 ml ale or porter, 500 ml dark, aromatic rum, and 250 ml brandy or lightly-aged scotch malt whisky.

Blow My Skull, or Blow My Skull Off

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