<p>never really appreciated the taste of alcohol, maybe I’m missing something. (though I do appreciate some other social effects!) </p>
<p>so I must say my current philosophy is to take shots and wash them down with copious amounts of milk or ice cream (ice cream being the best). the less time I spend tasting that burning sensation, the better.</p>
<p>but I read somewhere that EtOH apparently buffers the taste (whatever that means – it can’t be acid-base buffering…) of the flavor compounds in beer and wine, as some sort of explanation why dealcoholified wines (or beer?) don’t taste as good. Translation, anyone? Is EtOH just a better ester / tannin solvent, or something?</p>
<p>if that’s true, it’s a pity, cuz I can’t even drink 5% wine without running to a chaser.</p>
<p>lately though, I was given some sort of herbal high-proof Columbian vodka. after washing away the mouthfire with ice cream, there was this sort of pleasant aftertaste that remained … even 30 minutes afterwards. so maybe there is something of value in the “taste” department of drinks, which I’ve mostly always ignored? but why then pay so much money for a well-aged wine? why not simply brew high-quality tea leaves in hot piping 40% food-grade EtOH?</p>
<p>I don’t know why you’d drink something if you can’t stand the taste and have to wash it down w/ice cream. Calorie-for-calorie, I’d go straight to the ice cream.</p>
<p>I never liked beer and only like a few wines. I love girly drinks, like a Cosmo or Blue Hawaiian and am crazy about Long Island Ice Teas, but those have a lot of liquor in them. Jack Daniels and Coke is my favorite default drink. I wouldn’t do shots I didn’t like, even with the promise of ice cream at the end. I’d rather just not drink. No biggie.</p>
<p>Well, don’t you know? It’s not a taste issue, it’s an optimising-your-BAC issue. </p>
<p>Hmmm, concerning calories, AFAIK alcohol calories are “empty” calories and don’t really get absorbed. I think according to one study, all the resulting acetic acid (metabolite of EtOH), which could theoretically enter the glycolysis pathway, ended up in the urine. Which kind of makes sense since liver cells don’t try to return metabolites of poisons to the bloodstream. But the alcohol would still distort the results of a calorimeter.</p>
<p>(Which means if you tried to live off the energy content of liquor while stranded on a desert island, you’d prolly die…)</p>
<p>Why drink if you don’t like the taste? I like a glass of wine while I am preparing dinner and as a destressor after a long day at work at night… If I am eating mexican food I like a margarita. If I am out with the girls, I like a cosmo… I do like a top shelf tequilla like Patron or Cabo Abo and an Orange vodka like Absolut or Grey Goose in my drinks and I do ask for them. If I want to feel like I am on a tropical island I like Planter’s Punch.
As I have aged, I have fine tuned my tastes.</p>
<p>WuTang, I think this is probably the wrong forum to ask why people drink alcohol if it doesn’t taste good. I doubt many people here drink to get drunk as it seems you are doing. Most adults drink to get a mild buzz and wine and beer actually taste good to them. It sounds like you are drinking alcohol like most people take medicine.</p>
<p>Different alcoholic drinks have different tastes. I’ve never had a beer that I liked, but I love grasshoppers and most other cream/milk-based drinks. Oh, and Bailey’s mixed with Kahlua (or just plain Bailey’s).</p>
<p>I can’t imagine drinking if I didn’t like the taste. </p>
<p>That said I did drink some really disgusting drinks in college. If the milk/cream aspect helps you might try a white russian. I also tried something called chocovine at our local wine store - a mixture of wine and chocolate - and thought it was something I would have liked back then.</p>
<p>WuTangForeva, you could try my wife’s favorite cocktail, a Colorado Bulldog (for years she thought it was called a Colorado Boulevard…). Dark rum, kahlua and cream topped off with Coke or root beer. Just describing it makes me screw my face up–it’s the absolute essence of what I never want in a drink–but it sounds like you might like it.</p>
<p>My airplane drink (evening flights) with my free Southwest drink coupons is Bailey’s mixed with club soda on the rocks. Tastes like a chocolate soda. Love it.</p>
<p>Wrong. Empty calories are found in foods (including alcohol) that are high in calories but low in nutrients. The calories don’t just pass through the body without being absorbed–if you drink enough, you’ll gain weight. “Empty” just refers to the nutritional value.</p>
<p>D1’s drink - Gin and Tonic, Hendrick’s gin, use cucumber rather than lime, she mashes up cucumber pretty well so you get a very fresh cucumber taste. Great as a summer drink.</p>
<p>My only mix drink, Cosmo - Equal parts of vodka, Cointreau, cranberry juice, half part of freshly squeezed lime juice. Fill a cocktail shaker with ice, add all ingredients and shake vigorously. I like to use chipped smaller ice, so when you shake you’ll get some ice chips in the drink. Freshly squeezed lime juice gives it some pulp.</p>
<p>Time to grow up. That’s evidence of a problem. Adults don’t drink like that. They drink a glass or two of something because they like the taste and it enhances whatever food they are eating (a margarita with a Mexican meal, a fine wine with a nice dinner, a cold beer with a hamburger). Not to optimize blood alcohol content. </p>
<p>Here’s a concept. If you don’t like the taste, don’t drink it. I don’t care for pistachio ice cream, so I don’t eat it – I don’t try to make myself eat it by chasing it with something else. If you don’t care for the taste of alcohol, don’t drink it – don’t try to make yourself drink it by hiding it in something more palatable or finding the best chaser.</p>
<p>a kid in college I knew- who hated the taste of alcohol…would mix grain alcohol (190 proof) with Hi C Red. Got drunk quickly.<br>
Of course you can also use some of the bottle to clean your engine. If you can find it legally. This is NASTY stuff.</p>
<p>Drinking? Philosophy? Everybody sing along! :)</p>
<p>The Philosopher’s Drinking Song</p>
<p>Immanuel Kant was a real ****-ant who was very rarely stable.
Heideggar, Heideggar was a boozy beggar who could think you under the table.
David Hume could out-consume Wilhelm Freidrich Hegel.
And Wittgenstein was a beery swine who was just as sloshed as Schlegel.</p>
<p>There’s nothing Nietzsche couldn’t teach ya 'bout the raising of the wrist.
Socrates himself was permanently ****ed.</p>
<p>John Stewart Mill, of his own free will, after half a pint of shanty was particularly ill.
Plato, they say, could stick it away, half a crate of whiskey every day!
Aristotle, Aristotle was a bugger for the bottle,
And Hobbes was fond of his Dram.
And Rene Descartes was a drunken fart: “I drink, therefore I am.”</p>
<p>Yes, Socrates himself is particularly missed;
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he’s ****ed.</p>
<p>I agree with Pizzagirl. I eat stuff I dont love because it is polite ( when a dinner guest), or because I know it is good for me and I * should*.
But why would I drink something, that wasn’t really " good" for me, if I didn’t enjoy it?
That is crazy.</p>
<p>I happen to like alcohol, I like wine occasionally with a meal, I like good beer on a hot day with a baseball game and I like to sip 15 yr old scotch straight on a winter weekend afternoon.
( I also like Patron tequila- straight with salt and lime chaser)</p>
<p>Some people should stick to tea. ( which could also be an interesting discussion- many tea shops now in Seattle- some with a mind boggling selection)</p>
<p>I also enjoy alcohol but my days of drinking to maximize my BAC are well behind me. </p>
<p>Wu, before you run out to find grain alcohol, Commonwealth ABC stores do not stock the stuff. Thank goodness. I vaguely recall this product being used in my college days to create a trash can punch which we were all lucky to survive. </p>
<p>EK, I like your suggestion of the tea shops. People think tea is tea but it has so many variations.</p>
It’s not a taste issue, it’s an optimising-your-BAC issue. </p>