The cure that is worse than the disease

Dublin, in all of its drunken, rowdy, binging, messy weekend glory, is not a pretty sight. Caught in the crossfire between careering legions of stag party revellers, under-age school girls and slumped over eccentrics, one could be forgiven for casting an eye back to more civilised drinking days gone by – when in ancient Rome, for example, the scent of the hyacinth plant would waft through the warm air and compliment the lusty taste of a cask of red wine. Or, when in Egypt your favourite slave would feed you your favourite potent concoction from mouth of a golden goblet.

That said, for every oil painting you have seen depicting the ancient art of drinking majestically and with restraint, you can rest assured that, positioned just outside of the frame, there was a drunken maniac singing and waving his toga over his head.

The world has been getting unbecomingly and shamefully drunk for 5,000 years. And by the same token humankind has been feeling the effects of this excess for all of that time. According to researchers, hangovers began the day the first primitive man swallowed the first primitive gourdful of the first primitive brew. And the first hangover cure was invented the following morning.

Medicine and experience both dictate that no one is immune from a hangover. The only sure way to avoid one is to stick to non-alcoholic drinks. And if you have to drink alcohol, it’s wisest to do so in moderation.

So much for science. For all those who chose to ignore the above and instead resume your search for the holy grail of hangover remedies, take heart in the knowledge that your ancestors and your friends across the water have done a hell of a lot of the research for you. Feast your eyes on the recipes, potions and amateur chemistry experiments that the following eager mixologists have cooked up throughout the years.

Hair of the dog that bit you

The most trusted and time-honoured medicine of them all, this term dates back to 1546. Prescribing that the afflicted chase the alcohol that debilitated them in the first place with more of the same, the preferred pedigree of ‘dog hair’ depends largely upon nationality of the drinker. Here in Ireland we remain faithful to whiskey, hot water and sugar while in Switzerland brandy with peppermint is preferred. Top Dog the world over, however, remains the Bloody Mary.

Italy

Ancient Romans manfully braced their stomach linings with owl eggs mixed with seasoned powder from ground-up amethysts. They are also said to have shoved fried canaries down their gullets. Yet these days the Italians lay off the birdlife, instead torturing themselves with a liquid hell known as Fernet Branca, the reasoning behind which seems to be that anything tasting this bad must do some good. Although made from rhubarb, it has been described as tasting more like it’s been strained from coal tar and raw sewage. Some try diluting it over ice, with soda or with coffee; however, the suffering is just the same. You may as well just take it straight.

Puerto Rico

Here seasoned drunks swear by rubbing half a lemon under their drinking arm. This doctrine is reliant, however, upon the premise that the patient rubs the lemon clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere, anticlockwise in the South. Otherwise it may not work.

American Indians

On waking up to the after-effects of the white man’s fire water, some American Indian tribes would run until they broke into a sweat. They would then lick the sweat and spit it out, to get rid of the poison.

The wild west

As if life wasn’t hard enough back then, cowboys struck down by a night of hard drinking used to make a strong tea from jackrabbit droppings. When it was ready, they would strain it and drink it every 30 minutes without flinching. Grrrrrrr.

China

Chinese acupressure holds that the large intestine can be ‘quieted’ by its owner placing their right thumb against the fleshy spot between the left thumb and forefinger.

Japan

A recipe adopted by many Japanese is a special yellow broth of vegetable stock concocted by former taxi driver Kazu Tatishi. Tatishi was eventually arrested for practicing this medicine without a license, however he continues to stand by his cure, claiming that it’s capable of killing cancer cells, producing 30 types of antibodies and preventing the meanest of hangovers.

Jewish

The old cure spooned up by every Jewish mother is chicken soup, believed to calm the stomach and combat dehydration. Another remedy, shared by both Jews and Arabs, is a small glass of olive oil knocked back before drinking.

Russia

Seeming to punish rather than to cure, the Russian remedies fight acid with acid. Many, on waking up to a vice-grip headache and churning nausea, plump for an early morning glass of salty water or brine drunk from pickled cucumber or sauerkraut jars.

Haiti

Here the approach is psychological, natives sadistically sticking 13 black-headed pins in the cork of the bottle that inflicted the hangover on them. Even more disturbing, however, is the outer Mongolian practice of draining a glass of tomato juice containing a pickled sheep’s eye.

So there you have it, from Jewish mother to Japanese taxi driver to Indian chief, from the ridiculous to the sublime, a cure for whatever ale may ail you.