How to drink without getting drunk?

[Craig_G]

@Warren Taranow

I wouldn’t want to spit a drop of an ancient or rare or beautiful wine.

I’m way over this. At my group events I’m a full-time spitter. Once you get used to it, it is easy to appreciate and enjoy the wine. I think it also helps me drink less when I’m actually drinking.

[Mikhail_M]

The only time honoured method for minimizing the alcohol effect is to eat really fatty food about 30 minutes prior to and during alcohol consumption. I’m taking about butter, fatty bacon, the like. This effectively coats your insides with a barrier preventing alcohol from easily being absorbed. This, however, doesn’t eliminate its uptake altogether, so if you drink too much, you will find yourself in bad shape come morning.
The only other thing that I’ve heard of actually working against alcohol metabolism is the Succinic acid. I’ve never tried it, so cannot attest to it.

[ToddFrench]

Ask Jorge his secret - it’s taken him years to build up a tolerance for alcohol, so he doesn’t ralph into a water pitcher or on a pretty lady’s dress at an offline.

[Mark_C]

@Mikhail M

The only time honoured method for minimizing the alcohol effect is to eat really fatty food about 30 minutes prior to and during alcohol consumption. I’m taking about butter, fatty bacon, the like. This effectively coats your insides with a barrier preventing alcohol from easily being absorbed. This, however, doesn’t eliminate its uptake altogether, so if you drink too much, you will find yourself in bad shape come morning.
The only other thing that I’ve heard of actually working against alcohol metabolism is the Succinic acid. I’ve never tried it, so cannot attest to it.

Succinyl Choline also guarantees you won’t get a hang-over. The taste sux, though.

[Mike_V_e_r_h_i_l_l_e]

@Mikhail M

The only time honoured method for minimizing the alcohol effect is to eat really fatty food about 30 minutes prior to and during alcohol consumption. I’m taking about butter, fatty bacon, the like. This effectively coats your insides with a barrier preventing alcohol from easily being absorbed. This, however, doesn’t eliminate its uptake altogether, so if you drink too much, you will find yourself in bad shape come morning.
The only other thing that I’ve heard of actually working against alcohol metabolism is the Succinic acid. I’ve never tried it, so cannot attest to it.

Eating fatty food does not coat the absorptive mucosa of the small intestine (where absorption takes place). It does however slow gastric emptying witch allows gastric ADH to break down the alcohol in the stomach prior to release into the intestine. Gastric Alcohol Dehydrogenase varies widely in humans depending on race and gender.

[Gerhard_P]

@Craig Gleason

@Warren Taranow

I wouldn’t want to spit a drop of an ancient or rare or beautiful wine.

I’m way over this. At my group events I’m a full-time spitter. Once you get used to it, it is easy to appreciate and enjoy the wine. I think it also helps me drink less when I’m actually drinking.

Absolutely true - I´m fully enjoying a fine wine the same when spitting as when swallowing. If you are used to it you can wet your palate and even your tongue perfectly, taste it, feel the texture and length, only the wine is eventually not going down your esophagus (which doesn´t have any tasting buds at all).

The only difference is the effect (next day)

[Robert_B]

@ericleehall

I notice that the fatter I get the more I can drink…

I suppose that should work…

[Joe_B]

How about you just don’t drink too much if you don’t want to be drunk.

[Nolan_E]

Get a job in the wine industry. I haven’t felt drunk in 3 or 4 years.

[Kevin_Kitagawa]

@Gerhard P.

@Craig Gleason

@Warren Taranow

I wouldn’t want to spit a drop of an ancient or rare or beautiful wine.

I’m way over this. At my group events I’m a full-time spitter. Once you get used to it, it is easy to appreciate and enjoy the wine. I think it also helps me drink less when I’m actually drinking.

Absolutely true - I´m fully enjoying a fine wine the same when spitting as when swallowing. If you are used to it you can wet your palate and even your tongue perfectly, taste it, feel the texture and length, only the wine is eventually not going down your esophagus (which doesn´t have any tasting buds at all).

The only difference is the effect (next day)

Agree. I actually think I taste it just as much if not more by spitting because I get to taste it on the way out…For tasting events it pretty much doesn’t matter, I will be spitting. For offlines I’ll start spitting less than halfway through…I might make some exceptions but really, I want to be able to taste everything…The wines at the end of a get together tend to get less attention and I think spitting at least gives me the chance to give them a fair go.

[David_T1]

@M Champney

@Mikhail M

The only time honoured method for minimizing the alcohol effect is to eat really fatty food about 30 minutes prior to and during alcohol consumption. I’m taking about butter, fatty bacon, the like. This effectively coats your insides with a barrier preventing alcohol from easily being absorbed. This, however, doesn’t eliminate its uptake altogether, so if you drink too much, you will find yourself in bad shape come morning.
The only other thing that I’ve heard of actually working against alcohol metabolism is the Succinic acid. I’ve never tried it, so cannot attest to it.

Succinyl Choline also guarantees you won’t get a hang-over. The taste sux, though.

Can’t get a hangover when you can’t drink because you’re paralyzed. Never heard of administering it orally, though.

[Henry_Kiichli]

@Mike V e r h i l l e

gastric emptying witch

She sounds scary.

[Anton_D]

This concept is age old, and other than anecdotes, does not seem to have much basis in practice.

Recall, acetaldehyde is the product of alcohol dehydrogenase’s action on alcohol. Increasing alcohol consumption in the presence of exogenous alcohol dehydrogenase will then shift the metabolic burden to aldehyde dehydrogenase…a hangover product. Taking a product to more rapidly create that from alcohol may not be the brightest thing to do, even if the urban legends about alcohol dehydrogenase were found to be true.

[Chris_Seiber]

I attended a bachelor party once, where the bachelor had done little drinking in his life and was worried about how the alcohol would affect him. So, on the advice of some friend or coworker he talked to, he chugged a bunch of glasses of milk right before the bachelor party, having been told that would insulate him from the affects of the booze.

He seemed to do just fine, though I don’t really know how much he drank or how he would have done otherwise. But he kept saying how amazingly it worked.

Anyone know if there’s any truth to that one? It’s not something I’m going to do, but since we’re on the subject . . .

[Nola_Palomar]

In our winery we have a plaque in the tasting room with the 3 Rules of Captain Moro (Juan’s captain when he was in the Spanish Military).

So back then, a CocaCola was more expensive than a bottle of wine so when he would call the troops into formation half never showed up.

1. If you can’t pee, don’t drink.
2. When you drink, eat
3. Drink Slowly

Now, Juan says that protein binds with alcohol and eating protein will slow absorption of alcohol into the gut and thus slow absorption in the blood.

[edwardmilstein]

Try 2-3 capsules of vitamin E 25 min before starting to drink.Does an amazing job of slowing down the alcohol absorption. Was taught this 35 yrs ago by a professional in the hotel business that was constantly drinking with clients and needed to stay clear headed for the end of the night negotiation on rates.Always kept her swizzle sticks also, to keep track of how many drinks she had.

[David_Glasser]

Other than “drink slowly,” I think these tricks are largely ineffective. Those that seem to work are supported by anecdote or theory, not by evidence. I’d need to see a well-designed study plotting BAC over time with and without the intervention to be convinced.