Glassware for Serious Whiskey Drinkers

By George Manska, CSO, CR&D, Arsilica, Inc., sensory researcher, inventor, entrepreneur

Part 2- Ethanol Effects on Sensory and Social Perception

Few understand ethanol’s impact on the olfactory. High vapor pressure, low boiling point, and surface tension accelerate evaporation, and it is the most abundant airborne molecule in whiskey. Definition: Highly volatile anesthetic (nose-numbing), sharply pungent when concentrated. Spirits = 40% ABV ethanol + 60% water flavors and <2% character flavors.

Ethanol and Water Comparison

Sensory ethanol effects:

Researchers have known these for years.

• Raises detection, identification, and discrimination thresholds; subtle aromas are masked, undetectable, unidentifiable, and/or indistinguishable (peach vs. passion fruit).

• Disrupts calcium ion flow, suppresses cyclic nucleotide-gated channels, delays impulse firing, slowing and suppressing sensory data flow to the brain.

• Sharp pungency detracts from the focus on detection and identification.

• Ethanol (around 40% plus in upper headspace at rim) molecules are first to bind/block most olfactory neuron receptors, leaving few to identify character aromas (nose-blindness, olfactory fatigue, ethanol lock-out).

• The drinker is unaware: Smell ability degrades painlessly, unconsciously.

Experiential memory:

Nose-blindness occurs without warning. Evaluating several samples, we may notice: “I don’t smell anything!” or “I can’t identify this smell,” or “They all smell the same.” Eventually, one asks, “It’s whiskey; what should I smell?” Experiential memory caches sensory, visual, emotional, and conversational details of previous experiences and, when asked, acts as a “personal safety net” to provide information for situational problems, yielding a possible answer: “...recently you noted oak, floral, honey, mild spices.” Re-smelling to verify the suggested aromas, you may concede detection, accurate or not. Congratulations, you are validating your past tastings, diverted away from objectively evaluating your sample. Stop, wait for five minutes, allow mucous flow to refresh, then retry.

Innate group socialpsychological influences:

Spirits educators avoid these issues.

• Why are so few women whiskey club members? Female olfactory receptor neurons (ORNs) are 43% more abundant than male, and female protect/nurture instincts are much higher. Ethanol pungency raises caution alarms when smelling from tiny-rim tulips. Few female tulip users sniff whiskey orthonasally, preferring retro-nasal sampling from the oral cavity diluted by saliva to avoid pungency.

• Less olfactory-sensitive males don’t mind pungency, and clubs are primarily a fraternal male bonding scene with membership signified and validated by using the ritual fraternal tulip icon. Cross-gender peer pressure, “do what we do,” is common with obvious items like choice of glassware, no doubt contributing to the growing number of women-only whiskey clubs.

• At 17 United States country-wide spirits events, we performed 2,914 A-B comparison tests of a glass engineered to divert ethanol versus a tulip containing the same spirit. Results: 87% of males and 98% of females preferred the engineered glass, with a 97.5% data confidence level. However, at all events we’ve attended, well over 95% of whiskeydrinking males use tulips, the universal signal of recognition, to affirm, “Hi, we’re fraternity brothers.”

• Widespread macho attitudes (higher proof = manly) exist regarding ethanol, strikingly similar to attitudes toward hot peppers or tequila shots “Stronger (or more) is better.”

The following misconceptions are also ingrained into the belief systems of most spirits drinkers:

» “Avoid ethanol” drinking procedures solve tulip ethanol problems, so High proof = high quality = better whiskey; cask strength is best

» High pungency means high proof (quality). “Of course, it's pungent! It’s good stuff, man up and drink!”

» High price = high quality (higher proof = higher cost)

» Whiskey buyers always check proof/ ABV first.

» Tulip glasses must be scientific; if they weren’t, no one would use them. Tradition = truth.

From the very first tulip sniff, the emphasis is on strong, pungent, olfactory ethanol. It’s not too difficult to understand how misconceptions regarding ethanol become fact in the absence of science or proper education, especially to the majority of drinkers with only a superficial drinking interest and no interest in whiskey appreciation.

Industry education is a failure:

Unhealthy attitudes aren’t ever directly addressed, yet without tacit rejection, they become surreptitiously inferred and assumed through decades of widespread, long-time tulip use, which repetitively reinforces pungent ethanol on every nose with every sniff as the expected benchmark of the spirits tasting experience.

Brand ambassadors, spirits industry educators, WSET, and sommelier courses employ tulip glasses to educate, yet do not teach sensory or ethanol’s influence on social group mentality. These discussions consume time, divert from priorities of buying, selling, and distributing whiskey, and few are willing to risk their reputations by rejecting the accepted tulip norm. Sadly, the simple “dock glass” tulip may have created/perpetuated more problems than solutions. As well as our society accepts and promotes drinking, it is a shame we have left the true issues so unfinished with our “let someone else do it" attitude.

A simple sensory-engineered glass design provides an alternative by:

• Enlightening drinkers, distillers, and educators to better quality and a higher level of enjoying spirits,

• Dispelling aberrant social attitudes,

• Supporting gender equity and inclusion, and

• Raising the quality standard, all by reducing up-front olfactory ethanol.