National Council for Hotel
Management & Catering Technology’s
B.Sc.H&HA- IV Semester Syllabus
PRE-MODULE
GUIDED READING
INTRODUCTION
TO ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES
A. Alcohol and Alcoholic Beverage
“Alcohol” was originally a generic term applied to
any product arrived at by a process of vaporizing and condensation. Alcohol
is derived from Arabic word al-kohl. Kohl is a very fine staining powder used
cosmetically. The name is applied to spirits produced by distillation and
rectification as it becomes very refined in the process.
Alcohol is a volatile mobile fluid
obtained by fermenting a liquid containing sugar, the strength of which can be
further increased by distillation.
Methyl Alcohol (Methanol) and Ethyl
Alcohol (Ethanol) are the two main kinds of alcohol.
Methanol is useful for some
industrial purposes, whereas it is poisonous as a drink. Ethanol if consumed
sensibly, is beneficial. It has a faint but pleasant ethereal smell.
Pure alcohol is a colourless, clear
liquid with a burning taste.
Alcoholic beverage derives its
colour from the wooden cask in which it is matured, and/or from caramel or
vegetable dyes which may be added during its maturation or bottling.
Any potable liquid, which contains
0.5-75% of ethyl alcohol or ethanol (C₂HƽOH) by volume, is
known as an alcoholic beverage. Those liquids with more than 75% ethyl alcohol
are mostly used as medicines and anaesthetics.
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B. History and Evolution
Alcoholic
drinks have been inextricably bound up with man’s history since time
immemorial. Precisely when grain and grape were first deliberately fermented is
not known, but it is certain that by the time of the Pharaohs, both brewing and
wine- making were well established.
Archaeologists excavating ancient tombs have found the remains of beer, while
on the walls were paintings of grapes being harvested and crushed and wine
being stored in clay vessels.
The
first documentary evidence of beer-making was discovered on clay tablets dating
from the Sumerian or Mesopotamian civilization, which flourished over 5000
years ago in the fertile lands between the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers, in
what is now Iraq. Inscriptions on tablets described more than twenty different
varieties of beer.
The
making of intoxicating drinks probably developed independently more or less the
world over. In Africa, sorghum and millet were the preferred grains, while the
ancient Chinese used millet and rice. In Latin America, the Aztecs had their
own beer Gods, while Brazilian Indians produced dark smoky-tasting brews from
manioc roots and grain roasted over hardwood fires. South American Indian women
made a drink called Chicha by chewing maize kernels, spitting them out into
pots, mixing the mush with water and leaving it to ferment.
Wine
played a central role in the lives of ancient Greeks and Romans, as evidenced
by their paintings and writings, and the beautiful vessels they made for
storing and drinking the beverage. The ancient Greeks liked their wine strong
and heavy. They spread grapes on wicker trays and dried them in the sun before
making them into wine. The Romans had similar tastes, and concentrated their
wines by pouring them into amphorae and exposing them to heat. Wine was
traditionally diluted with water being served.
In
classical Greece and later Rome, wine was also used in cooking, not initially
as a means of adding flavour, but as a marinade. The discovery that the acids
in wine could be used as a tenderiser proved a boon, especially as meat often
came from older animals and could prove extremely tough. As well as making
tough meat more supple, marinating removed excess salt from meats that had been
encrusted with it, or soaked in brine, for preservation. Wine vinegar, its
alcohol lost to acetic acid, may have been used initially, but wine itself
appears in sauce recipes in the historically important late Roman cookery book
of Apicus (3rd century AD). The wine itself was commonly infused
with spices to mask the rank flavours of oxidation or acetification.
The
Romans were great ambassadors for wine. They planted vines in many of the
countries they conquered, including modern-day Germany, Austria and France, all
of which had hitherto been home to beer-drinkers. In the 1st century
AD, the Roman historian Tacitus stated that beer was the usual drink of Germans
and Gauls, while Pliny the Elder wrote in AD77 that the tribes of Western
Europe made “an intoxicating drink from corn steeped in water”.
In
medieval times, beer continued to be the principal drink of the cooler climes
of northern Europe, although the spread of Christianity meant that some grapes
were cultivated so that wine could be made for religious ceremonies. In
southern Europe, wine reigned supreme.
Beer-making
on a substantial scale was the preserve of the religious orders. Many of the monastic
settlements that sprang up across Europe from the 5th century
onwards had large breweries. The monasteries supplied not only their own needs,
but also those of thirsty travellers and pilgrims.
Beer
was also brewed at home, where it was viewed as a domestic score, on a par with
cooking and cleaning. In medieval Britain, most ale was produced by women known
as “ale wives”. The most successful of these early home brewers attracted
people to their houses, which became the social centres (public houses) of the
community.
Spirits,
liqueurs and fortified wines differ from wine and beer in that they all depend
to some degree on distillation. Even the fortified wines- Sherry, Port, Madeira
and the like- are made stronger (and in some cases naturally sweeter) than
ordinary wine by the addition of a distillate.
Distillation
(from the Latin destillare, to drip) is the process of evaporating or boiling a
liquid and condensing its vapour. Alcohol has a lower boiling point than water
(about 78°C compared to 100°C) so when a fermented drink is heated, the alcohol
vaporises sometime before the water is driven off as steam. When the alcohol
vapour hits a cool surface, it condenses and reverts to a liquid with a much
higher percentage of alcohol than the original drink. If the condensed liquid
is boiled up again, and the procedure repeated, the alcohol content in the
condensed liquid will be even higher.
Much
academic debate has been generated in the last 30 years or so as to when and
where distillation was first discovered. The Greek philosopher Aristotle, who
lived in the 4th century BC, writes of distillation as a means of
purifying seawater to make it drinkable. He comments in passing that the same
treatment can be given to wine, which is reduced thereby to a sort of “water”.
He was tantalizingly close to the break-through, but the experiment did no more
than prove for him that wine is just a form of modified water, and that a
liquid can only derive flavour from whatever happens to be mixed with the water
that forms its base.
The
documented beginnings of systematic and scientifically founded distillation, at
least in Europe, come from the celebrated medical school at Salerno around
AD1100. Wine had long been regarded as having a range of medicinal properties
(a view that has once again found favour in the 1990s), and alcohol was
believed to be the active ingredient that gave wine its healing powers. The
extraction of what was held to be soul or spirit of the wine (the alcohol),
through distillation, is what led to the naming of distillates as “spirits”.
It
was not until 16th century that “alcohol” was used specifically with
reference to distilled spirits.
The
medicinal uses of spirits were to endure for hundreds of years. It was Arnaldo
de Villanova, a Catalan physician of the 13th century, who first
coined the Latin term aqua vitae, “water of life”, for distilled spirits,
indicating that they were still held to be associated with the promotion of
vitality and health. (That term lives on in the Scandinavian aquavit, the French
eau de vie and similar spirituous names.)
The
earliest distillates were almost certainly derived from wine, since it had a
more salubrious and exalted image than did beer, but grain distillation to
produce the first whiskies and neutral spirits followed, in the Middle Ages.
Many of these prototypes contained herb and spice extracts, or were flavoured
with fruit, in order to enhance their medicinal properties. The additives also
conveniently masked what must have been the fairly raw taste and off-putting
aroma of the unadulterated liquor. Anyone who has smelt and tasted clear spirit
dribbling off the still in a brandy distillery (or, for that matter, has had a
brush with illicit Irish poteen or American moonshine) will know how far such
untreated spirit is from the welcoming smoothness of five-star cognac or single
malt Scotch. The infused distillates were the antecedents of many of the
traditional aromatic liqueurs and flavoured vodkas of today.
That,
for centuries, was the official account of the birth of distilled spirits. In
1961, however, an Indian food historian, O. Prakash, argued that there was evidence
that distillation of rice and barley beer was practiced in India around 800 BC.
If so, it probably arrived here from China even earlier. The current theory
cautiously credits the Chinese as the discoverer of the art.
It
seems strange that soldiers of Alexander the Great failed to encounter
distilled alcohol when they invaded India in 327BC. The campaign is credited
with having brought back rice itself to Europe, but rice spirit appears to have
been overlooked. Perhaps, if it was drunk at all by the invaders, it was
diluted, and was not therefore perceived to be any higher in alcohol than the
grape wine with which they were familiar.
The
original and still widespread distillation vessel, used in the Cognac region of
France, as well as by the whisky distillers of Scotland, is the pot still. It
consists of the only three elements absolutely essential to the process: a pot
in which the fermented product (malted grains, wine, cider etc.) is heated; the
alembic, or tube, through which the alcohol vapour driven off is sucked; and
the condenser where the steam is cooled and reliquified. To obtain a better
quality product, spirits are generally distilled at least twice for greater
refinement, so the still has to be started up again. Moreover, not all of the
condensed vapour is suitable for use in fine liquor. The first and last
portions of it to pass through (known as the “heads” and “tails”) are generally
discarded due to the relatively high level of impurities they contain. The
invention of the continuous still in the early 19th century, in
which the process carries on to a second distillation uninterrupted, made
spirit production more economical and easier to control. This is the method
used to produce France’s other classic brandy, Armagnac, and the continuous
still is now the preferred apparatus for most spirits production worldwide.
Probably
the first spirit to be taken seriously as an object of connoisseurship, as
distinct from being purely medicinal (or just a method of using surplus grapes
or grain), was the brandy of the Cognac region of western France. It was
noticed that the superior, mellower spirit produced by the light wines of Cognac
responded particularly well to ageing in oak casks. The casks were
traditionally fashioned out of wood from the Limousin forests of the region.
Cask-aged spirits derive every bit of their final character from the precise
shade of tawny in the colour to their richness and roundness of flavour, from
the maturation period they undergo in wood. They will not continue to develop
in the bottle. The complex classification system for Cognac in operation today
is based on the length of time the spirit has been aged. It is testimony to a
reputation for painstaking quality that dates back to around the end of the
1600s.
Scottish
and Irish whiskies rose to similar prominence not long after. Their differing
production processes result in distinct regional styles, depending on the
quantities of peat used in the kilns where the malted grain is dried, the
quality of the spring water used in the mash, and, some have claimed, the shape
of the still.
Varieties
of whisky are made across the world these days, from North America to Japan,
but all attempts to replicate the precise taste of great Scotch- for all that
the ingredients and procedures may be almost exactly identical- have
inexplicably foundered.
Where
a distilled drink stops and turns into a liqueur is something of an elusive
question. The one constant is that, to be a liqueur, a drink should have some
obvious aromatizing element. This doesn’t mean that all flavoured distillates
are liqueurs- flavoured vodkas are still vodka- but there are no neutral
liqueurs. Some of these products have histories at least as venerable as those
of Cognac and Scotch. The most notable are those produced by the old French
monastic orders. Bénédictine, the herby, cognac-based potion that originated at
the monastery in Fécamp, in Normandy, can convincingly lay claim to a lineage
that rolls back to the beginning of the 16th century.
The
first and greatest cocktail era, which arrived with the advent of the Jazz Age
in the 1920s, rescued a lot of the traditional liqueurs from the niches of obscurity
into which popular taste had relegated them. The Bénédictine monks may have
been a little shocked to hear that their revered creation was being mixed with
English Gin, American Applejack, Apricot Brandy and Maple syrup, shaken to
within an inch of its life and then rechristened the Mule’s Hind Leg, but at
least it was drunk- as were any giggling flappers unwise enough to knock back
three of four of them.
Cocktails
continue to prove popular, especially in the USA and the Caribbean, where clubs
and dedicated bars promote new blends as well as old favourites, largely based
on the “big five”: whisky, gin, vodka, white rum and brandy.
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C.
Alcohol
and Health
Alcoholic
beverages affect the central nervous system and tranquilise it. It increases the
blood pressure temporarily. Because of its tranquilising effect, it is
considered as stress-reliever. Usually effects of alcohol remain in the body
for 24 hours.
There
is a very small proportion, 0.003%, in the blood of each human being, even in
life-long abstainers, and after the urine of a healthy person- it is regarded
as the world’s second oldest disinfectant.
o
Benefits of alcohol
§
It is a food- creates heat and source of
energy
§
Alcohol can be an appetizer or an
accompaniment to the food
§
It enhances flavour of the food
§
It aids in digestion
§
It accentuates sensory perception
§
It sharpens memory
§
It depresses centres of anxiety and
relieves tension and stress.
§
Gives some protection to the heart and
blood vessels by raising the level of good cholesterol.
§
It exhilarates the spirit and can, on
occasions, produce a magnificent glow.
o
Abuses of alcohol
Long-term
drinking can lead to serious illness including liver cirrhosis, hastening of
age, deteriorating of the central nervous system. Heavy drinking impedes the
speed and quality of performance. The people who regularly consume alcohol in
excess undergo personality changes and become unpleasant and unreliable.
There
are about 100 calories in a single unit of alcohol. The amount of calories adds
up quickly and can increase weight. However, replacing food with alcohol as a
source of calories denies the body essential nutrients and vitamins.
A
guide to the number of calories found in a variety of drinks is given in the
table below. The number of calories in different brands of drinks can vary
significantly, so the following information is only given as a rough guide.
A
guide to the number of calories found in drinks
|
||
QUANTITY
|
DRINK
|
CALORIES
|
Fortified
wines
|
||
Sherry
50 ml (½ gill)
|
Dry
|
55
|
Medium
|
60
|
|
Sweet
|
65
|
|
Wines
|
||
113
ml (4 fl oz) glass
|
Dry,
white or red
|
75
|
Rosé
|
85
|
|
Sweet
|
100
|
|
Spirits
|
||
25
ml (1/6 gill)
|
Gin,
whisky, vodka, rum, brandy
|
50
|
Beers,
lagers and cider
|
||
284
ml (10 fl oz)
|
Lager,
low alcohol
|
60
|
Light
or mild ale
|
70
|
|
Brown
ale
|
80
|
|
Lager
|
85
|
|
Bitter
|
90
|
|
Cider,
dry
|
95
|
|
Cider,
sweet
|
110
|
|
Alcohol
is also responsible for increasing free radicals (O, OH, CO, NO, and NOO) in
the body. These free radicals are highly unstable and cause damage to DNA,
carbohydrates, lipids and proteins in the body that leads to the development of
heart diseases and aging.
Alcohol
is absorbed directly into the bloodstream from stomach and therefore instant
energy is provided. The absorption is slowed down if drink is accompanied by
food. Most of the alcohol is burnt up by
the liver and what remains is discharged through urine or perspiration. The
liver can break up only one unit of alcohol per hour.
1
unit of alcohol= ½ pint of ordinary beer or lager
50 ml of Sherry
(1/3 gill)
50
ml of vermouth/aperitif
125
ml of wine
25
ml of spirit (1/6 gill)
To avoid damage to health, expert medical opinion
suggests that the alcohol intake should be limited to:
21 units a
week for men (spread throughout the week)
14 units a week for women (spread throughout the
week)
NOTE:
In Scotland, an ordinary spirit measure is 1/5 of a gill or 1¼ units. In
Ireland, it is ¼ of a gill or 1½ units. Extra strength lagers and beer have
sometimes two or three times the strength of ordinary beers. Many low calorie
drinks contain more alcohol than their ordinary equivalent.
Every
pleasure has a price, so over-indulgence will get a hangover too. A hangover is
a headache and makes feel awful all over. It results from:
§
Dehydration of the body caused by excess
consumption of alcohol;
§
The presence of congeners (additives
etc.) in the drink;
§
And a lack of good sound sleep.
To avoid hangover, prevention is
better than cure: control the alcohol intake.
Sensible
drinking requires a mature outlook. However, if occasions or situations weaken
the resolve, the best advice is to:
§
Eat well before an evening of drinking;
food lines the stomach and acts as a buffer against the alcohol;
§
Avoid mixing drinks; stick to one style
if possible, such as beer or wine;
§
Avoid concoctions such as laced drinks,
dubious punches, weird wine cups and cheap nasty wine;
§
Drinking of lots of water, milk or fruit
juice before, during and after a heavy drinking session.
If
one still feels the hangover next morning, try bitters like Fernet Branca or
Underberg- known as Correctifs.
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D. ALCOHOL AND SENSORY EVALUATION
It
is estimated that taste may be at least 80% smell. As proof, try tasting while being
under a heavy cold. We taste mainly to savour the product, to assess quality
and relate it to price. We also taste to check and record the drink’s
condition, to monitor progress and to determine its potential. Ideally, serious
tasting should be done in perfect conditions such as:
·
Good natural daylight;
·
In a room with north-facing windows
where the light is not subject to variations;
·
Where there is no possibility of
competing with distracting, pungent odours;
·
Where conditions are comfortable and
where there is sufficient space to manoeuvre without being jostled.
Stemmed glasses: These are best for
tasting and the International Standards Organisation (ISO) tasting glass is a
good example. The sherry copita or the paris goblet or the tulip glass are also
considered suitable shapes. These are broad at the base and narrow at the top
so as to concentrate the smell as the drink is being swirled to release its
bouquet.
Tasting glasses: these should be
washed in plain hot water- detergents leave an odour- and dried and polished to
a brilliance with fresh, clean cloths. Dirty cloths leave rancid odours and
nowadays there is trend for guests in restaurants to smell the empty wine glass
before the wine is actually served. They do so in order to detect if there are
any off odours which would adversely affect the aroma and taste of the wine.
Wine
taster’s glass
The
taste of a drink is detected in different parts of the mouth but most
essentially on the tongue. Sweetness is detected at the tip and centre of the
tongue, acidity on the upper edges, saltiness on the sides and tip, and
bitterness at the back. When tasting a drink, consider the following
characteristics:
·
Sweetness and dryness will be
immediately obvious.
·
Acidity will be recognised by its
gum-drying sensation, but in correct quantities acidity provides crispness and
liveliness to a drink.
·
Astringency or tannin content, usually
associated with some red wines, will give a dry coating or furring effect
especially on the teeth and gums.
·
Body is the weight or feel of the drink
in mouth.
·
Flavour is the essence of the drink on
palate.
·
Overall balance is determined by the
evaluation of all the above elements, which hopefully are in correct
proportions. Balance is particularly important in terms of acidity and sugar
when assessing white wine and in terms of tannin and fruit when appraising red
wine.
Taste
is detected on different parts of the tongue
Whatever
the drink, the three factors- Colour, Aroma and Taste- govern its appreciation.
Beer drinkers, especially real ale enthusiasts, take their beer tasting or
‘sampling’ seriously. They have evolved some 250 terms to describe the balance
of characteristics and taste of their special brews. Many beers, however, taste
as their style suggests- bitter, light, mild, cream and so on.
Spirits,
such as whisky, rum and brandy, because of their high alcohol content, are
often professionally judged ‘on the nose’ (by smell) and by sight. A little of
the spirit is put into a glass and sniffed or rubbed into the palm of the hand
and nosed.
Liqueurs
and some fortified wines, such as
sherry, may be treated in the same way but more often they are sipped and
savoured then spat out into a receptacle.
Of all
the drinks, wine seems to generate the most passion. A glass of wine seems to send some people into
a frenzy of emotive words and highly colourful phrases. That is their
prerogative, but it is best to remember that wine was made to be drunk and
enjoyed. Of course, conversation and discussion regarding the merits of a wine
can be enjoyable and beneficial especially at wine tastings and social
occasions, but keep it simple and be true to own opinions.
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E.
Production
of Alcohol
·
Fresh Water: Fresh water is used for
producing alcohol, but even among freshwater sources, the composition of the
water varies greatly. Diverse water sources bring different levels of purity
and different minerals to the fermentation process. Mineral levels in water
from one part of the country are different from other parts of the country.
Water from a mountain spring has different characteristics than water of the
tap. Brewers and distillers are very particular about the mineral content in
the water, as that will affect the final product.
·
Sugar: Yeast acts on the sugar present
in ingredients to produce alcohol and carbon dioxide. This sugar must be
soluble in nature. Fruit juices have natural soluble sugar which is acted upon
by yeast to produce beverages like Wine (grape juice), Cider (apple juice) or
Perry (pear juice).
Cereals and
grains have complex sugar in the form of starch. The
starch
gets converted to simple soluble sugar while germination (malting).
The malted grain is
crushed and brewed and thereby acted upon by yeast for
the fermentation
process.
Example of brewed and
fermented alcoholic beverages- Beer, Sake.
·
Yeast: It is a unicellular organism. It
is found in enormous quantities in the soil, plants and air. Yeast may be
natural or cultured. Natural yeast is found all around in environment. These
yeasts hold on to grape skins and form a dull whitish waxy substance known
Bloom. Cultured yeasts are pedigree strains of natural yeasts cultivated in a
laboratory. They are used because they are efficient and more reliable than
natural yeast. Natural yeast is susceptible to weather conditions, and are
generally active till a lower percentage of alcohol is produced.
Sulphur
dioxide is added to the fermenting liquid to eliminate harmful wild yeasts and
vinegar-forming bacteria. The taste of sulphur disappears during maturation.
Many
traditional wine makers favour the use of natural or ambient yeasts.
Cultured
yeasts are majorly of four types-
§ Saccharomyces
Cerevisiae: used for top fermented beers at warmer temperature of 15-25°C.
§ Saccharomyces
Carlbergensis: used for bottom fermented beers at lower temperature of 5-9°C.
§ Saccharomyces
Apiculatus: also known as Starter Yeast or Wild Yeast used to start fermentation
of wine upto the alcohol level of 4%. Also known as Weak Fermenters. These are
aerobic and impart an ‘off-flavour’ to the alcohol. So, the modern winemakers
usually wash off these wild yeasts by the addition of sulphur dioxide, as they
have less tolerance to SO₂.
§ Saccharomyces
Ellipsoideus: true wine yeast, tolerant to sulphur dioxide and anaerobic (able
to work in the absence of oxygen).there are many varieties of this yeast each
suited to its native region. Depending upon the amount of sugar in the grape
juice, it ferments quickly upto 13% alcohol, and then slowly upto 16% alcohol.
·
Fermentation Temperature: Yeasts can
only work between 5-35°C temperature. Once
it starts, the process should continue until the desired the desired alcohol
level is reached. The fermenting process increases temperature, so temperature
has to be strictly controlled to ensure the yeast remains active. Usually,
white wines are fermented slowly at 15-20°C to produce crisp, delicate and
aromatic wines. Red wines are fermented quickly at 25-30°C to extract more
colour and make them full bodied. High temperature causes loss of bouquet, and
development of vinegar microbe Asceti
Mycodermae.
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(SOURCE: THE BEVERAGE BOOK by Andrew Durkan and John A. Cousins)
