Whiskey and Air

[cowdery]

One thing that bothers me about this subject is that, from drinking session to drinking session, several other things are more likely to change than the whiskey. By which I mean your own sense organs and the environment that affects them, what's in the air you're breathing, what was the last thing you had in your mouth (if you'll pardon the expression), even your mood. Doesn't everything taste better when you're happy?

My sense (not empirically proved) is that those factors are more likely to affect the way whiskey tastes to you from occasion to occasion than changes to the whiskey itself. Also, sense memory can be fickle, like all memory, I suppose. Someone needs to design an experiment that allows for a meaningful control.

[MauiSon]

That sounds easy. Just open a bottle and pour into two half bottles. Pour one back into the original bottle. Cork both and wait a month (or 2 - 6). Then, compare. The temporal factors are completely erased, except for the tasting-order factor.

Edited October 30, 2012 by MauiSon

[gblick]

We've heard enough reasons for why air oxidizes alcohol. I want to hear reasosn for why air cannot possibly change th flavor of whiskey in an opened, but corked bottle, over time.

The way I see it is that there is only a finite amount of oxygen in the airspace of a bottle, and once that oxygen has been depleted (I don't know how long this takes) the taste will no longer change. But once you open the bottle again, and let in more fresh air, the taste can evolve some more until the oxygen contained within is once again depleted. Kinda makes sense to me, but in reality I'm just theorizing.

[skidfive]

I know I am new here but this is a very interesting thread. I just wanted to add that I had picked up a bottle of wild turkey 101 at the store the other day for my usually mixing with pepsi. I noticed the bottle had a dried line around the plastic when I took it off and that the paper seal that covers the top/cork was a different color. My initial thought was that something had spilled on it so no big deal.

So I make a drink mixed and I can tell straight off the bat that it tasted different the a normal fresh opened bottle of WT101. I went back to the bottle and poured a straight glass and the smell was not "normal" either. I tasted it and came to the same conclusion as the mixed drink that I had made, something was different.

I then poured my roommate a glass and he thought the same thing. Almost as if the flavor had gone away. I recorked it and figured I would give it another look over in the morning and then when I tried to open it the next day the cork broke off inside the bottle.

I thought I had read before that you do not want your whiskey stored touching the cork because it will eat away at the cork and change the taste of the whiskey, so maybe that is what happened. But all I know is there was some issue with the cork/seal on this bottle and the flavor was definitely not normal.

Edited November 4, 2012 by skidfive

[p_elliott]

I know I am new here but this is a very interesting thread. I just wanted to add that I had picked up a bottle of wild turkey 101 at the store the other day for my usually mixing with pepsi. I noticed the bottle had a dried line around the plastic when I took it off and that the paper seal that covers the top/cork was a different color. My initial thought was that something had spilled on it so no big deal.

So I make a drink mixed and I can tell straight off the bat that it tasted different the a normal fresh opened bottle of WT101. I went back to the bottle and poured a straight glass and the smell was not "normal" either. I tasted it and came to the same conclusion as the mixed drink that I had made, something was different.

I then poured my roommate a glass and he thought the same thing. Almost as if the flavor had gone away. I recorked it and figured I would give it another look over in the morning and then when I tried to open it the next day the cork broke off inside the bottle.

I thought I had read before that you do not want your whiskey stored touching the cork because it will eat away at the cork and change the taste of the whiskey, so maybe that is what happened. But all I know is there was some issue with the cork/seal on this bottle and the flavor was definitely not normal.

[skidfive]

Contact WT they will replace it if there is something wrong with it.

thanks for the info. Luckily Vons took it back and even swapped out. Just showed them the dried ring on the bottle and the discoloration.

[msong]

http://vinturi.com/products/spirit.html

Apparently someone else is buying into the conspiracy theory. New Spirits version...

[p_elliott]

thanks for the info. Luckily Von's took it back and even swapped out. Just showed them the dried ring on the bottle and the discoloration.

I hope Von's sent it back to WT as they surely would like to know what went wrong with it.

[skidfive]

I hope Von's sent it back to WT as they surely would like to know what went wrong with it.

Hopefully, since then I have been 2-0 on recent Turkeys though. Might have just been one out of a million issue or something with the cork/seal.

[Restaurant man]

http://vinturi.com/products/spirit.html

Apparently someone else is buying into the conspiracy theory. New Spirits version...

Just what I've always NEEDED. A vodka aerator, and just in time for christmas This this is just plain stupid. (no offense to those that believe) it's just my opinion.

[LostBottle]

http://vinturi.com/products/spirit.html

Apparently someone else is buying into the conspiracy theory. New Spirits version...

The perfect add-on to go with my Buffalo Trace 159x distilled Clix Vodka! The aeration will really help enhance the taste of nothing. Keep it away from my ultra-aged ryes though, I lean the other way and use argon on those.

Edited November 12, 2012 by LostBottle

[tanstaafl2]

Just what I've always NEEDED. A vodka aerator, and just in time for christmas This this is just plain stupid. (no offense to those that believe) it's just my opinion.

Is it the aerator that is stupid or the vodka?

Or both...

:slappin:

Got my brother, the family vodka drinker, a bottle of Double Cross vodka (Distilled 7 times so it has that going for it! I had never heard of it, new vodka from Slovakia trying to compete with the big boys as a "premium" vodka) because it has a unique rectangular bottle and cap shape that allows the cap to be engraved. They were doing a special with free engraving so I put his name on it and underneath engraved "Real Men Drink Whiskey!".

Think I should get him the aerator as well?

:cool:

Edited November 12, 2012 by tanstaafl2
Damned typos

[luther.r]

I was placing a TPS order recently so I got a few bottles of their single barrel OWA. I decided tonight to do an experiment on air time.

I poured half of one out into another bottle and marked it, and I'm storing it side by side next to a full one (from the same barrel) in the same place at room temperature. I plan on opening the half-opened one every few days for a few seconds and agitating it a bit. In 4-5 weeks I'll do a tasting of the full, sealed bottle and the half bottle and see the results. If Anybody in the Chicago area would like to join me, more taste buds would make this more scientific!

[squire]

Air exposure does change a whisky. I can't quantify that in any scientific sense but after a few decades of pulling corks you notice a few things. For example, a bottle with a less than air tight cork stoppage will subtly shift it's flavor profile if you keep it around long enough. My solution is to drink it before it evaporates.

[Curtisc84]

It does indeed take a lot of will power! Since I have very little I suppose it is why I was hoping to perhaps move the process along with something like a venturi.

Sounds like perhaps some things just need to develop in their own time!

[tanstaafl2]

You can always fill your hot-tub with whiskey, multiple pleasures.

Hmm, mucosal membranes and alcohol. if you think your mouth burns when drinking you may not want to think about what else might burn in a hot tub full of booze...

Not sure there would be much pleasure to be had there unless you have an affinity for the masochistic side!

[squire]

Also be mindful of the evaporation process, some loosely fitted bottles will show a decreased fill level in just a couple of weeks . . . at least that's what you tell the wife.

[luther.r]

I was placing a TPS order recently so I got a few bottles of their single barrel OWA. I decided tonight to do an experiment on air time.

I poured half of one out into another bottle and marked it, and I'm storing it side by side next to a full one (from the same barrel) in the same place at room temperature. I plan on opening the half-opened one every few days for a few seconds and agitating it a bit. In 4-5 weeks I'll do a tasting of the full, sealed bottle and the half bottle and see the results. If Anybody in the Chicago area would like to join me, more taste buds would make this more scientific!

[ATTACH=CONFIG]14551[/ATTACH]

Follow up on my experiment:

I continued to open the half-filled bottle for a few seconds and agitate it about once a week. On this past Friday, my GF and I did a blind taste test. We opened the bottles (one of them for the first time) and each poured for the other one in two identical glasses (mine were Glencairns, hers snifters) with a mark on one glass so we could differentiate.

On the nose, glass 1 showed slightly more wood and alcohol and glass 2 was pure caramel/butterscotch.

On the palate, glass 1 showed more floral and fruity notes, and a bit more wood. Glass 2 was less lively, but with slightly rounder body, and showed less proof.

On the finish, glass 1 was spicier and longer, with some burn. Glass 2 was medium and mellow.

Glass 1 = no air time

Glass 2 = ~5 weeks air time

Overall, the two were very very similar. I found no evidence of the bottle with air time "opening up" or developing new flavors; I feel it just lost some bite and some of the fruitiness, which made the mellower characteristics come through more evidently.

Both of us were able to correctly guess which bottle was the one that had been open longer, but neither of them stood out as significantly "better" than the other.

[SFS]

Nicely done, luther, a well controlled experiment. Do you plan to continue it in the coming weeks? If so, at what time intervals?

[luther.r]

Nicely done, luther, a well controlled experiment. Do you plan to continue it in the coming weeks? If so, at what time intervals?

Well, now that the second bottle has been open I think the experiment would be tainted, as both bottles will be getting air. Though I suppose there could be merit in seeing how a 10-week open bottle compares to a 5-week etc.

[HP12]

Atta boy Luther. Good report out.

[UncleJohnsBarrel]

Thanks for the update on that, it was really interesting to read the results you came up with. My experience with the Weller line has been the same in regards to the nose, in that bottles that have been open always smell like a bowl of brown sugar oatmeal when you sniff it but does come up a little short when you actually drink it.

Keep the experiment results coming!

[mosugoji64]

Thanks for the report, Luther! That's surprising to me as I frequently return to bottles and find that time has changed them, usually for the better. Maybe that has as much to do with expectations for a new bottle as actual change. Expectations may relax a bit after the bottle has spent some time on the shelf. Whatever the case, blind tasting is truly the only way to put assumptions to rest and you put together a solid test. Thanks again!

[squire]

Interesting and perhaps telling, or perhaps posing another question. Is the whisky opening up to me or am I just getting used to a new brand.

[HP12]

Interesting and perhaps telling, or perhaps posing another question. Is the whisky opening up to me or am I just getting used to a new brand.

It opens up for me, at least most wheaters do. Have nosed and tasted definitive differences in several of my OWA's, Willett's and VW expressions to name a few. Along with another Bourbon enthusiast, a recent three sample tasting of our K&L Willett 21yo over the course of 5 month intervals revealed a change for the better.

After a couple months of air time, the viscosity became thicker, the caramels and dark fruit came out more vibrant than with the initial opening. The third sample at the five month mark revealed not much change from the second sampling at about the 2 month mark.