Beer tastes more refreshing when it’s cold, and whiskey tastes more alcoholic when it’s warm.
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Beer feels most refreshing when it’s ice cold, while spirits like whiskey taste most alcoholic when they’re warm. These flavor changes may be due to the way water and ethanol molecules cluster together within the beverage.
Ray Jean and his colleagues at the Chinese Academy of Sciences are investigating how factors such as temperature and alcohol content (ABV) affect the molecular behavior of drinks such as beer, rice wine, and baijiu, a Chinese distilled spirit similar to whisky. I wanted to research what it does and what it means for taste.
They first measured the surface tension of these alcoholic beverages while increasing their ABV levels. They then used nuclear magnetic resonance imaging and computer simulations to “zoom in” on the combinations, or clusters, of water and ethanol molecules in beverages of varying alcohol content and temperature. Finally, we partnered with a Chinese baijiu company to conduct a taste test. Goryo Gorge.
Zhang said what they discovered surprised them and overturned what chemists once considered “common sense.” He and his colleagues had expected the surface tension to decrease uniformly as the alcohol content of the drink increased, but it actually changed in discrete “steps.”
The researchers found that these jumps occurred when the clusters of water and ethanol molecules changed shape, going from a compact pyramid-like structure to a long chain-like structure. Jiang said colder, lower-alcohol liquids have a higher proportion of pyramid clusters, resulting in a more refreshing flavor.
“As the temperature drops, the structure becomes more compact, so the taste of cold beer becomes more pungent,” he says.
Hot drinks and drinks with higher alcohol content have more chain-like clusters, and their flavor is more pungent and ethanol-rich.
gavin sachs Researchers at Cornell University in New York say their study reveals new details about the chemistry of ethanol and water in drinks, but linking molecular clusters to taste is extremely complex. The fiery flavor of ethanol stimulates the same taste receptors that detect heat. As a result, researchers have learned which chemical properties of a hot drink – the way its molecules cluster, its temperature, and how it interacts with other liquids in the human mouth – are responsible for the changes in its taste. It’s difficult to pinpoint, he says.
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Source: www.newscientist.com
