According to the recollections of Tomsk writer Erwin Polle, the Soviet “babbler” was produced by mixing low-quality fruit and berry juice with bad alcohol. It cost about 2.20 - 2.30 for a 0.7 gram bottle (half a liter of vodka - 2.12). There was a large assortment of wines from fraternal countries (Bulgarian, Yugoslav, Hungarian). Makarevich shares his memories of the effect of the Egyptian balm “Abu Simbel” (volume about a liter, price around 8 rubles). “Abu Simbel” did not cause a hangover the next morning, although it was stronger than 40 degrees.
The cult wine of the Soviet era is the 18-degree “Solntsedar” (1.25 per bottle), produced from Algerian wine materials at a number of Soviet wineries. It was also called “turpentine”, “bug pest” or “fence paint”. As RBC writes, at one time this fruit and berry drink, which was reflected, in particular, in the works of Venedikt Erofeev and Yuz Aleshkovsky, was discontinued in the early 80s due to numerous claims to quality. Polle reports that in the USSR hundreds of drunkards died from Sorlntsedar.
No less famous in the Soviet Union were the port wines “777” (“Three Axes”, “Lesopoval”) - a fortified fruit and berry wine produced by a surrogate method, it cost 3.40, the Azerbaijani 19-degree “Agdam” (2.60), also known as “Kak dam”, used by the broadest segments of the population.
The modern Russian language is a topic that worries many. It changes very quickly, so it requires understanding not only by specialists. Back in the twenties of the last century, slang words became popular, after some time slang began to be used in everyday life, and this still happens. “Gift”, “money”, “face”, “shmurdyak” - not everyone knows what it is. But many people use such words every day. Today we will talk about such a concept as “shmurdyak”, we will try to figure out what it is and how it arose.
Meaning
“Shmurdyak” or “mumble” is a low-quality drink, cheap alcohol, in particular grape or fortified wine made from berries and fruits, which is prepared from low-quality wine material, water, alcohol, sugar and dyes. Its main purpose is to use it to achieve exclusively alcoholic intoxication. The taste of the drink does not play any role here; it can accommodate various ingredients. "Shmurdyak" can be cheap port, vermouth or fruit wine. The name "shmurdyak" is slang; there are no alcoholic drinks under this brand name.
Values in different sources
Since low-quality ingredients are used to prepare “mumbler” (shmurdyak), the drink often turns out to be poisonous and can lead to poisoning if consumed. In some cases, deaths have been observed when taking such questionable alcoholic beverages. Young people often use the slang word “shmurdyak”; what it is can be found in several sources:
- Cheap wines that were popular in the USSR. They were prepared by mixing alcohol and inexpensive juices.
- Cahors, which was prepared from low-quality wine material, sugar and alcohol.
- Inexpensive ports.
- Fruit and berry wine prepared at home for the purpose of sale and not for personal consumption.
USSR times
Shmurdyak became widespread during the Soviet era throughout the Union. Popularly, such alcoholic drinks of dubious origin were called “ink”, “mumbler”, “shmurla” and others. At that time, cheap wine materials were supplied from Algeria. It was brought to the Union by tankers, and already on the territory of the USSR, low-quality fortified wines were produced on its basis. Over time, when the government began an anti-alcohol campaign, it was decided to stop the production of shmurdyak.
Russian Federation
After the USSR collapsed, cheap alcohol appeared in Russian stores, which contained low-quality imported spirits. Over time, dubious medicinal tinctures with a strength of up to ninety degrees appear in pharmacies. But the shmurdyak (we already know what it is) never gained popularity in the Russian Federation, as it did during the Soviet era. Young people today prefer beer and low-alcohol drinks. Now the production of shmurdyak continues. It is carried out mostly in the North Caucasus and Krasnodar Territory. These drinks have a strength of up to nineteen degrees and are placed in seven hundred gram bottles.
Belarus
Bormotukha in Belarus was produced in very large quantities, and in such quantities it was consumed. There were about two hundred different inexpensive wines. In this country, the surrogate alcoholic drink was called “charlik”, “byrlo”, “bodrilo” or “kompot”. In local slang, a seven-hundred-gram bottle of shmurdyak was called “adult”, and a half-liter bottle was called “children’s.” Today in Belarus, chatter is used as much as before. But over the past few years, the production of surrogate wines has decreased by twenty percent. Since 2013, it was planned to ban the sale of shmurdyak, but these plans were never implemented.
Other countries
In Lithuania, cheap wines were called “ink” or “boob”. Today, inexpensive alcoholic drinks in this country are as popular as ever. In France, "mumble" is made from waste and waste from winemaking. The bottles are always written “vin de table”, which means “table wine”. In the United States, cheap wines became popular after the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution was repealed. They were drunk mainly to get drunk. So, “shmurdyak” (we know what it is) here received the slang name bum wine (wine for tramps). Today, several brands of such drinks are also produced.
Stamps
During Soviet times, cheap, low-quality wines were sold in glass bottles. The labels read “Wine”, “Vermouth”, “Cahors”, “Fruits and berries” and so on. Some popular drinks like shmurdyak had their own names:
- wine "Anapa" was called "Anna Pavlovna" in slang;
- the wine "Golden Autumn" was popularly called "Zoya Osipovna";
- Port 777 was simply called "Three Pokers" or "Point";
- vermouth was called "Vera Mikhailovna" in the jargon.
In addition, there were other alcoholic drinks, which were popularly called slang names.
Thus, shmurdyak is a low-quality alcoholic drink made from winemaking waste, which was extremely popular during Soviet times. Today, young people prefer to drink beer and low-alcohol drinks. But this slang word has not gone out of use and is used by many young people. Mumbling, ink, surrogate, shmurdyak - all this refers to wines of dubious origin. Quite often, drinks were made at home in order to sell them, but not for personal consumption. There have been many cases of poisoning with low-quality alcohol, which were accompanied by vomiting and even death. But this did not stop people who continued to drink inexpensive alcoholic drinks.
Was there a culture of wine consumption in the USSR? There are different opinions on this matter. Wine specialists say that yes, there was, historians say the opposite. The fact remains: they drank wine in the Soviet Union. Cheap fortified ones were designed for the unpretentious mass taste, while the vintage ones were preferred by the Soviet intelligentsia.
An ordinary fortified wine with a proud Portuguese name "Port wine" can be considered the king of Soviet wines. Not in terms of quality, but in terms of production and consumption volumes - in the USSR they produced and drank many times more of it than dry vintage wines and champagne combined.
Ordinary workers bought cheap port wines "777" , "Agdam", guilt "Solncedar", "Alminskaya Valley", "Fruit and berry" and other similar drinks that cost from a ruble to two and were popularly called “babble”, “gnilushka”, “ink”. These wines were produced by simply mixing low-quality wine material with ordinary alcohol and bottled at enterprises in eleven republics of the country.
You could see it on sale "Azerbaijani wine", "Armenian wine","Georgian wine", "Moldvinprom", "Ministry of Food Industry of the Ukrainian SSR" etc. You can treat the popular Soviet drink in any way you like, but it was made in compliance with sanitary standards, so with moderate consumption, the wine could not cause significant harm to health.
It is worth noting that in the Soviet Union not only cheap fortified wines and ports were produced, but also high-status branded drinks made according to all the rules for the wine-conscious public. As a rule, these were Crimean wines from the South Coast - "Madeira", incomparable ports "Livadia", "Massandra", "Yuzhnoberezhny", "Surozh", as well as Muscat dessert and liqueur wines, which, without exaggeration, can be called the pearls of Soviet winemaking.
In the USSR, brand drinks "Vermouth", essentially related to fortified wines, began to be produced in 1947. Initially, the quality of the product was very mediocre, since the wine materials used were far from the best. Until the mid-70s, red vermouth cost 1.02 rubles, and white vermouth 1.07 rubles. - this price was quite suitable for fans of frequent drinking, but consumers with higher demands were of little interest in this drink.
In the late 60s, better flavored wines appeared "Bouquet of Moldova", "Mountain Flower", "Morning dew", and a little later - vermouth "Extra", produced using original Italian technologies and used mainly for cocktails.
Table wines produced in the USSR
Soviet table wines, natural and high quality, were produced mainly in Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine, and the southern regions of the RSFSR. Given the opportunity to choose, the buyer preferred semi-sweet table wines - vintage or ordinary. The best semi-sweet wines were considered to be the famous Georgian "Khvanchkara"- Stalin’s favorite wine, also popular today "Kindzmarauli", "Twishi", "Alazani Valley", "Akhasheni", "Ojaleshi". Massandra semi-sweet drinks were no less in demand. "Muscat", "Aligote", "Aluston".
Dry vintage wines, as a rule, were consumed by gourmets and members of the intelligentsia. In addition to famous Georgian wines "Tsinandali", "Gurjaani", "Mukuzani" and others. Ukrainian products were also distinguished by decent quality "Oksamyt of Ukraine", Moldovan monovarietal "Feteasca", "Riesling", "Cabernet", "Pino", excellent blending "Negru de Purcari".
Although ordinary dry wines were inexpensive, they were not in great demand. People called them “sour” or “cracker” and drank them when there was no choice in the store or when there was a lack of funds for something stronger. It is noteworthy that some wineries in the southern regions of the country worked closely with local state farms and, along with wines, bottled natural juices into glass containers. Among such enterprises, it is worth noting the largest in the USSR and the second in Europe, the Sennovsky wine and juice plant, located in the Krasnodar Territory. He produced grape juices from different grape varieties - cabernet, riesling, traminer, rkatsiteli.
Imported wines in the USSR
Of the foreign wines on the shelves of Soviet stores, mainly products from socialist countries were presented. There was no mass demand for imported wines: they were quite expensive and were drunk on occasion.
Many people remember Bulgarian wines well "Bear's Blood", "Gold autumn", "Tamyanka", "Monastery Hut", Hungarian vermouths and wines "Tokay", "Bull's Blood", "Tsirfandli", Romanian wines "Cabinet", "Old lock", "Kotnari".
Less often, Soviet liquor stores received wines produced by capital countries - Spanish, Portuguese, but usually they did not reach retail, as they were still sold out at the bases. They could be purchased through friends, as they said then “through connections,” with an overpayment.
The same champagne
At the end of a short excursion into the wine past, let’s remember “Soviet Champagne”, an iconic brand of the USSR era, a symbol of happiness and joy, a must-have drink for any festive table. Along with the TV show "Blue Light", Olivier salad, "dry" sausage and tangerines, champagne was one of the obligatory New Year's paraphernalia. Everyone without exception drank it to the sound of crystal glasses and the chiming of the Kremlin chimes, so on New Year's Eve it was difficult to “get” champagne.
Despite the accelerated production technology, different from the original, and the disdainful attitude of experts and specialists, our people have always loved “Soviet champagne”. It was produced in the categories brut, dry, semi-dry, semi-sweet and sweet at different factories. Moreover, the taste of wine of the same type was individual for each manufacturer - it depended on the wine materials used and technological subtleties.
5 interesting facts about wines and winemaking in the USSR
- In 1952, in Soviet Moldova, in the village of Cricova, a unique underground wine storage facility was created, which is still in operation. It is located at a depth of 50-80 m in former shell rock mines. This storage facility is a real underground city with streets with a total length of 113 km, named after wine brands, and even with traffic lights. It contains a private collection of G. Goering wines, captured in 1945 in Berlin, worth 15 thousand pounds sterling per bottle. There is also V. Putin’s own cave in the storage room with a rich collection of wines.
- Joseph Stalin's favorite wines were Georgian wines "Khvanchkara", "Majari" and "Kindzmarauli". The production of grape wines in the Georgian SSR was carried out by the Samtrest enterprises, which united exemplary state farms: Mukuzani, Napareuli, Kvareli, Tsinandali in Kakheti and Vartsikhe in western Georgia. The champagne wine factory produced Soviet champagne and grape wines. In the GSSR, by the 1960s, 26 brands of wine were produced: 12 of them were dry table wines, 7 semi-sweet, 5 strong, 2 sweet dessert.
- In 1937, the construction of the first factories began in the USSR for the production of champagne not in traditional bottles, but in hermetically sealed tanks. The method was called “reservoir”, and for its development prof. Frolov-Bagreev received the USSR State Prize in 1942.
- After the war G.G. Agabalyantsev proposed a method of champagneization in a continuous flow, for which the scientist was awarded the Lenin Prize. This technology made it possible to significantly reduce the cost of champagne. It is curious that the license to produce sparkling wine in this way was purchased by Argentina, Greece, Italy, the USA, Germany, France, Chile, Switzerland - not the last countries in the wine industry.
- A. Dorozhinsky, a well-known world authority in winemaking, after visiting the USSR, was shocked by the country’s success in wine production. In his book “Le livre du vin”, published in 1968 in Paris, among the main achievements of Soviet winemakers, he noted a unique three-week method for producing champagne; new developed grape varieties; the use of scientific achievements in the production of wine, in particular, ultrasound to accelerate the aging process of wines, electronic devices for assessing the taste of wine.
No matter what Western radio voices slandered about the planned Soviet economy, it still had one important and undeniable advantage - rationality. If we talk about alcoholic beverages, it was originally intended to make wine and cognac in the places where grapes grow. There was logic in this, of course... However, logic is not always friendly with common sense. So, tell me, what bright party head came up with the idea of producing wine in the Muslim republics of the Soviet Union?
Religion strictly prohibits Turks from drinking any alcoholic beverages. Hence the conclusion - in Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and the Turkmen SSR there were no winemaking traditions at all. Nobody argues that in Central Asia and the Caucasus there was developed viticulture, but nothing else was produced from sunny bunches except sultanas and raisins. People lived boring lives before the October Revolution.
In the 20s of the last century, “big bosses” in leather jackets and with Mausers appeared on the outskirts of the former tsarist empire. By pointing their guns at the sky, they substantively proved to the natives that there is no God. The previous local leaders, the Basmachi lords, were shot. They tore off the veil from other people's wives (while minimizing their number to 1). Rapid metamorphoses of public consciousness are a thing stronger than dynamite. The liberated resident of the East could now (just imagine!) look at other people’s women and drink. There was only one step left to such frivolity as distilling grape must into wine and alcohol. And it was done.
Even before the war, a cognac factory was built in the city of Agdam, Azerbaijan SSR. From that moment on, the story of “Agdam” began, the most famous “babbler” of the Soviet Union. The production of wine and cognac is always based on the experience and traditions of many generations. Alas, the newly-minted Azerbaijani winemakers could not boast of being either the first or the second. A brilliant way out of this difficult situation was found - to sell alcoholic beverages according to the instructions. The juice was squeezed out, poured into fermentation containers, sugar was poured in, alcohol was added at a certain stage, strained and bottled. All operations were carried out strictly using a stopwatch, in accordance with the approved technology.
They didn’t bother too much with raw materials. Saperavi? Cabernet? Pinot franc? What are you talking about! The company used all the grapes currently on hand. And the alcohol added for strength clearly had potato ancestry. The bouquet of “Agdam” always had a traditional fusel flavor. There was a certain viscosity in my mouth, almost a soreness. Nowadays this concept of “oskoma” is directly related to dentistry, and in the old Russian language it meant “melancholy and mental longing.”
Drinks in this category were usually bottled in 0.7 liter “land mines”. From the first sip, Agdamych jammed the intellectual potential of the Soviet citizen worse than the KGB radio station Voice of America.
It is not clear why, but this wonderful swill was very expensive - 2 rubles. 30 kopecks. In decent houses they didn’t put it on the table, you know bad manners. But the drunkard simply adored “Agdam”. Ege, 19% alcohol is not a big deal for you. For quick intoxication - this is it.
The yellowish label explained to the consumer that he was dealing with white port wine. Liars! There was no port lying around. Agdam is just Agdam. This is that rare happy occasion when a drink acquires a personal name, like champagne, cognac, armagnac, grog, rum or whiskey.
Azerbaijani swill was not drunk in glasses, it was sipped from the neck of a bottle. In central Russia, lovers of severe hangovers affectionately called wine - Agdam Zaduryan, Agdam Bukharych, Kak dam, Kreplenych.
Alas, this peculiar drink has sunk into oblivion. Probably forever. It stopped being produced with the beginning of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. The cognac factory in Agdam was completely destroyed during the fighting in the 90s of the twentieth century.
The real Agdam died like a Viking - he sank to the bottom along with the USSR longship. I'm sorry…
"I'm there today
Where do they give “Agdam”…”
Popular Soviet song
ERA OF "AGDAMA"
| “You from another generation can hardly comprehend the depth of those short words of revelation: “Agdam. White port... - wrote the famous Soviet poet. And indeed! For almost all representatives of today's youth, the word “Agdam” means nothing - A city somewhere in Central Asia or the Caucasus? The name of the Caucasian poet? One of the revolutionaries in the Caucasus? And for our generation, the word “Agdam” is like sweet music, heart-warming nostalgia for the years of our youth! If a referendum were held in Moscow during the heyday of the stagnation of developed socialism, then “Agdam” would certainly be recognized as the favorite drink! The most popular and favorite drink of students since time immemorial! No wonder another one of the Tsarskoe Selo lyceum students wrote: "Agdam"! How much in this sound merged for the Russian heart, how much echoed in it!” |
The love for inexpensive port wine is one of the mysterious distinctive features of our and slightly older generation, whose youth fell in the mid-60s - mid-70s of the last - twentieth century. This specific love will hardly be understood and felt by the generations that came after us!
All this was a measure of bitterness that we allowed - or was given to us - which later made it possible to distinguish the real from the false, honesty from hypocrisy, and in general made life colorful. If “Agdam” had not been in my life, I would probably love ballet.
The word “port” was a collective concept in the era of doomed socialism. There was no talk about the Portuguese original - a very narrow circle of people knew about its existence, who were terribly far from the people. Here their point of view on port wine.
"Port wine(from German. Portwein), porto(from port. Porto) is a fortified wine produced in northeastern Portugal in the Douro River valley. Port wine has a category of “designation of origin controlled” enshrined in Portuguese legislation. To guarantee and confirm authenticity, a special stamp developed by the National Institute of Douro Wine and Port is affixed to the neck of each bottle of port, under a shrink cap.”
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In the Soviet Union, until 1985, at least 2 billion liters of ordinary port wine were produced annually, and all other types of wine (including champagne, dry, vintage, liqueur, etc.) accounted for only 1.5 billion liters. More than 60 varieties of port wine were produced, of which 15 were high-quality vintage ones, having their own individual names (“Aygeshat”, “Akstafa”, “Alabashly”, “Kizlyar”, etc.). Most ordinary ports had names with numbering: White Port No. 12, White Port No. 33, Red Port No. 54, and so on. In the Soviet years, cheap types of port wine were classified as chatterboxes and were produced using a surrogate method - using cheap wine materials and ethyl alcohol. |
For the bulk of the population of the Soviet Union, behind the word “port” (or affectionately: “Portwesh”, “Portveshok”) there was a very discordant row of wines of very different quality at very contradictory prices and origin from various parts of the USSR. The samples from this cabinet of curiosities were united only by strength - from 16 to 19 “turns” - and sweetness.
The most beautiful of them - the fortified wines of Massandra and a few other vintage ports - were the lot of professors and the party-Soviet nomenklatura. The female part of the population of our country indulged in the Moldovan “Lydia”, “Zemfira” and “Isabella”.
Students and high school students drank what they had enough money for, but if they had a choice, they grabbed “Anapa” or “Sehra” (Turkmen port wine, which for some reason the manufacturers classified as a Madeira brand) - they had less sugar and did not need choke, as if from the Uzbek “Alabashli”.
And it’s just the end - “babble” - the infamous “Solntsedar” and “Bile Mitsne”, or in common parlance “Biomitsin”. There was a joke going around in those days: “The USA and China bought a huge batch of Solntsedar from the USSR.” The Americans are convinced that this mumbling makes blacks die like flies, and the Chinese use it as an effective contraceptive - Yes, if you drink a glass of it, let alone having sex, you don’t want to live!”
The Azerbaijani “Agdam” in such a wide spectrum was the golden mean, acceptable for the majority of “builders of communism”. It doesn't taste too bad and is affordable. Even the magic of numbers itself: “Two-two” (for young people I’ll explain: two rubles two kopecks) was already producing a mesmerizing effect. And if you also hand over an empty bottle, then in general it’s 1 ruble 85 kopecks!
Yes, the love of our youth had the taste of “Agdam” - thick, sweet and tart. We drank “Agdam” in steamed dumpling shops, in cheburek shops that smelled of rancid butter, in sandwich shops that smelled of mustard and black pepper, in ice cream parlors, in dusty hallways, in clouds of bluish exhaust fumes at the back of a river bus, at a graduation party in a school toilet, in in the forest at night near a tourist fire, in the vestibule of an electric train, secretly in the dark “on weekdays” and in the open at a festive banquet in a construction brigade, in the attic of a plank barracks during harvesting work on a sponsored collective farm and in a field in the rain among bags of potatoes, “in the park, where are the children’s mushrooms” after the All-Union Leninist subbotnik, on the march and during stops at many hours of festive demonstrations and already at parting with the “demonstrators” we finished off the leftovers in the park near the first metro station open at the entrance - “Novokuznetskaya”...
“Azerbaijani wine Agdam - white port” - magic words that make the hearts of thousands of former representatives of a new historical community of people - the Soviet people - tremble! No wonder Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky wrote: “Five words in a row, exactly five! But what they contain in themselves is something you, young people, cannot suddenly embrace!”
Here's how one of the ardent fans of this drink poetically writes:
Let’s focus our attention on the most beloved wine by all of us, and I hope by all of you, dear readers, which originates from the wonderful vineyards growing on the slopes of the Lesser Caucasus Mountains. Apparently, the name of this wine was given by the city of Agdam, located somewhere in the region of Azerbaijan with the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region. No one doubts the fact that the ripest, most selected grapes, watered by the generous Caucasian sun, and filled with mountain coolness, are used to make this most exquisite and divine drink. I will not go into the intricacies of winemaking and intimidate you, the reader, with sophisticated and obscure terms, but I will ask you just one question. Well, why, tell the reader, does it say on the modest but noble label that caresses the eye that this is white port? After all, it's pink. Or maybe I don't understand anything about color. But God be with him, with color. This wine is like sugar on the lips. The magical and mysterious word “Agdam” brings coolness and at the same time throws the thirsty one into the heat. Poets wrote countless lines about this wine. This wine has left an indelible mark on the modern history and culture of our people.
It is enough to give just a few examples. Beginning of the century:
Agdam with a simple and gentle gaze
I caress you too, my friend.
Extraordinary color pattern
The earth and sky suddenly burst into flames.
Fun time and pain of separation
I always want to share with you.
Let's shake hands
And we will be together, together forever.
Mid-20th century - patriotic:
Today I don’t drink Agdam, but tomorrow I’ll sell my homeland.
60s - the heyday of bard culture:
Ah, Agdam, my Agdam -
You are my religion.
You and my happiness
And my sadness.
The 70s - the heyday of stagnation:
Come to me, Agdam,
I will give you love.
Who drank Agdam today?
He's cute to any girl.
Just recently, about ten years ago, it was possible to buy real, unadulterated Agdam, which has a taste characteristic of this type of product, bitterish, with a pronounced aftertaste, in any lump for a very reasonable price. This was great, this was good! Where is this time? It's gone. That Agdam, which is now extremely rarely found in a shop window, is not the same Agdam, I assure you. Now there is nothing to treat a girl I know to a decent young man, but I really want to. I swear to my mother, if anyone shows me a place where I can buy a real Agdam, then I will become his sworn brother. Well, that Agdam, from the past, was assessed unanimously and unconditionally by the members of the independent commission as an “ovation.”
