Open Post: Hosted By The Trader Joe’s Bourbon Vanilla Extract That Teens Are Getting Drunk On

Some of you bitches were fancier than me back in the day, and I thought I was pretty fancy with my knock-off BOSS shirt from the swap meet and the bottle of Evian I always carried around (which was the same Evian bottle that I refilled with tap water). I say that you all were fancier, because apparently, getting buzzed on vanilla extract isn’t a new thing. It is to me, though, and it’s also new to a high school in Atlanta who had to let parents know that some students have been getting drunk on Trader Joe’s Pure Bourbon Vanilla Extract. Yes, vanilla extract! The hell do those kids think they are? Cake batter? Some muffin mix?!

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution says that at least one student at Henry W. Grady High School in Atlanta had to go to the ER because they drank coffee spiked with Trader Joe’s Pure Bourbon Vanilla Extract. “I’m going to guess your name is fucking Betty Crocker since you’re obviously a damn cake if you’re drinking vanilla extract” is definitely what the nurse said to that student while taking their information.

TJ’s Pure Bourbon Vanilla Extract is 35% alcohol, which is the same as Captain Morgan Rum. Vanilla extract isn’t considered booze because of a legal loophole from prohibition times. It’s $9 for a 4 ounce bottle at Trader Joe’s and around $15 on eBay. Students have been buying a bottle at Trader Joe’s and then spiking their Starbucks coffee with it. So the school had to put out a warning to parents:

This is not an indictment of Trader Joe’s at all, but parents please be aware that this product contains 35% alcohol and we have discovered that some students have consumed this intoxicant. Another thing to keep an eye out for.

Several AJC readers wrote in saying that getting drunk on vanilla extract was a thing when they were teenagers in the 90s. Like I said, lots of fancies out there. While those teen dignitaries were gracefully sipping fine coffee spiked with vanilla extract out of a Wedgwood china teacup with their pinky up as they sat in the back of a Rolls Royce driven by their chauffeur Wadsworth, us trash was drinking Boone’s Farms out of a paper bag in the park.

But seriously, if I was one of those kids’ parent, I’d be disgusted, ashamed, and I’d probably throw them out of the house for embarrassing the family name! I mean, that vanilla is $9 and a tall thing of black coffee at Starbucks is like $2. So that’s $11 to get a buzz that’s probably not even that good. For a few more dollars, you can pay a hobo to get you a 2 liter bottle of Popov from the liquor store, and then you can get a real kind of drunk. Not the kind of weak drunk you get from drinking vanilla extract! No kid of mine is going to be a wasteful drunk. Not IN THIS ECONOMY!

Pic: eBay