Shot! Shots! Shots!; is a chant you mostly hear in the club, a party, or a friendly bar cheering and jeering a particular individual to take their shots to everybody’s entertainment, or you might have even heard it from that hit song way back in 2012. Regardless of where you heard it from, shots have been part of the ever-multifaceted drinking culture anywhere in the world.
Connoisseurs of tequila, whiskey, brandy, gin, rum, cognac, etc. will tell you that it’s the highlight of their day to get their choice of poison in a seemingly unassuming small shot glass and downing it one go. But there is a question I think non-drinkers and drinkers are curious about, just how many shots are there in a handle?
What is a Handle?
Let us get it out; we are talking about liquor and nothing more, so a ‘handle’ here does not refer to anything used to hold another object or a way to manage a certain situation or problem. Nope, for this particular write-up, a ‘handle’ is a specific term used to describe any liquor bottle containing exactly 1.75 liters of delectable liquid alcohol, no more and no less.
At half a gallon, a handle measures more than double the average size of your standard liquor bottle. You’re probably thinking that any liquor bottle can be called a ‘handle.’ Well, actually, no, because the only time a liquor bottle is called a ‘handle’ is when it measures up to the standard of 1.75 liters.
Are all “Shots” equal?
Just like not all liquor is equal, so are the shots or, more specifically, the shot glasses made equal. It’s not the material used in making the shit glasses but more on the sizes and the fluid ounces or fl oz that each shot glass can contain. Most bars and clubs in America will probably have a standard size of around 1.25-1.5 US fl oz.
It’s a different story for the lovely state of Utah, where state regulation says that a shot is equivalent to 1.5 US fl oz or 44.4 ml as a standard. So if ever you’re in Utah, you know that no matter whatever bar you are in, you’ll get the same amount of liquor in your shot glass; regulation-wise, I mean.
Shots in a Handle
So the big question here that all you folks are dying to hear an answer to is just how many shots are there in a ‘handle.’ Well, to get that, let’s do some wholesome mathematics. Down to the nitty gritty, a standard ‘handle’ is about 1.75 liters of liquid spirit or delectable liquor at about 59.2 US fl oz and let’s say that we follow the standard shot, which is about 1.5 US fl oz, then all we have to do is divide the 59.2 US fl oz with the standard shot volume of 1.5 US fl oz you’ll get about 39.5 shots in a single handle.
Of course, you’ll probably get a different result if a different shot glass with a different measure of volume is used, as the ones mentioned a while ago in the computation. Hence, the information obtained is the closest account to how many shots are there in an actual ‘handle’ since the standard volume for a shot glass was used for the computation. This is not half bad if you are really into drinking the whole bottle or, in this case, the entire ‘handle.’ The next question should be, “Can you handle your shots?”.
I am a passionate beer connoisseur with a deep appreciation for the art and science of brewing. With years of experience tasting and evaluating various beers, I love to share my opinions and insights with others and I am always eager to engage in lively discussions about my favorite beverage.
