New Writing: I'd Love A Babycham
This post celebrates the power and glamour of drinks aimed at women.
I borrowed the title of today's blog post from the writer Margaret Galvin, who read from her essay about Babycham at a reading she gave to promote her beautiful book, Our House, Delirious.
What Is Babycham
Her essay was a love letter to Babycham, for the freedom it gave women. Babycham is a sparkling perry, made from pears, which has the look and feel of champagne.
Babycham was the first drink women could order for themselves in pubs in the 1950s. They saw it as a glamorous drink, which came in an elegant glass.
Photo description: This is the glass that Babycham was served in, a wide-bottomed glass with a gold rim and a picture of a deer with a yellow scarf on it.
Babycham Out of Style
Babycham was popular for a long time, but by the late '90s, when I was coming of age, Babycham and its successors, Stag and Ritz, were considered passé (although I drank Ritz.)
To me, Babycham felt like a drink that was palmed off on women because they couldn't handle 'real' drink. In the '90s, ladette culture was blooming. Women were necking pints of beer and cider and knocking back shots of tequila and vodka.
Return to Glamorous Drinks
The tide's been turning in recent years. I pretty much never see a woman with a pint in her hand now. Instead, they're drinking gin in bowl-shaped glasses and bubbles of Prosecco in tall, thin glasses.
Up to now I would have seen this as a kind of regression, as I cling to my pint bottles of cider.
But after listening to Margaret's essay, I now understand that it's a form of reclamation, a statement that these drinks are ours, our expression of glamour and freedom.
Our way of asserting our power to drink as we choose and to celebrate as we choose. Cheers.
You can share your thoughts about this post by emailing derbhile@writewordseditorial.ie or phone 0876959799.