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For more than two years now — from the second floor of a repurposed warehouse in the Dogpatch district of San Francisco — the young scientists and chemists at Ava Winery have been attempting to save the planet and conduct commerce by producing wine without grapes or fermentation. Recently, the company rebranded and shifted its focus: now known as Endless West, it is attempting to make brown spirits without the hidebound utilization of barrels for maturation.
In Endless West's 1,800-square-foot lab, there are no implements ordinarily associated with making wine or whiskey. Instead, one sees chemists quietly sitting at computers beside beakers, gas chromatography and mass spectrometer machines, and something called a liquid handling robot, which is loaded with test tubes that are filled with liquid from "real" wines and spirits. The white-smocked bio and analytical chemists are measuring and mapping the molecular profiles of standard alcoholic beverages. There is even a scanning area with an "electronic nose" to measure olfactory properties; something you likely won't find in a standard winery lab.
The quest is to tease out which "naturally derived" carbohydrates, sugars, proteins, amino acids, and lipids comprise a wine or spirit, and which components encompass the organoleptic profiles of various alcoholic beverages. Key aromatics and flavor molecules are being identified such as citrus-like esters from ethyl isobutyrate and pineapple-y aromas derived from ethyl hexanoate or the buttery qualities found in the compound diacetyl.
Once recognized, neutral distillates or grain alcohol is then added to the recipe to synthetically formulate a wine or whiskey.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 30 2018, @12:17PM (17 children)
This sounds like marketing material.
(Score: 5, Informative) by takyon on Thursday August 30 2018, @02:29PM
This is far from the first time someone has tried to do something like this, although Endless West's approach might have some advantages.
Tested: A Chemical Time Machine Makes Whiskey Taste Older, Faster [popsci.com]
How A Distillery Ages Bourbon In Days, Not Years [npr.org]
The scientific tricks that can age whiskey in days instead of years [qz.com]
The scientific arms race to age our whiskey [arstechnica.com]
Instead of using tricks to artificially age whiskey, they want to create the compounds and mix them. That kind of approach sounds a bit like a "chemputer". One day, maybe a relatively tiny machine will be able to output "whiskey" or other substances.
As for the wine thing, it seems that they found out that it was harder than they thought [foodandwine.com], so they switched to whiskey:
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(Score: 5, Interesting) by fyngyrz on Thursday August 30 2018, @03:03PM (15 children)
==>
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 30 2018, @03:11PM (5 children)
Isn't Maker's Mark a bourbon?
Quick wiki search [wikipedia.org]:
Must not be a whisk[e]y guy
(Score: 2) by danmars on Thursday August 30 2018, @03:24PM (4 children)
Bourbon whiskey /bɜːrbən/ is a type of American whiskey.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by danmars on Thursday August 30 2018, @03:32PM (3 children)
(To clarify, I do understand the parent figured this out.) Among people who don't drink these things, the naming conventions are definitely confusing.
I doubt they'll have too much trouble selling artificially-flavored "spirits" since, for example, people already buy many kinds of vodka (which is really just very simple chemistry). While knowing that a company is trying to come up with more artificial flavors to mix with alcohol and water, it doesn't seem particularly revolutionary to me. They're unlikely to run into lots of companies and countries fighting them over their products not being "real" like they would with wine, so labeling and marketing would probably be a lot easier.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 30 2018, @03:41PM (2 children)
Vodka drinkers and whisk(e)y drinkers tend to mostly be cut from quite different cloth..all the moreso flavored vodka folks.
But, don't worry. Alcoholism has a way of bringing one's funds down, and the freshly broke former whiskey snobs will be thrilled to have artificial Bourbon instead of being left with gin.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday August 30 2018, @04:14PM (1 child)
Gin is great IMO, and you can easily bring your funds down with craft [thespruceeats.com] or artisanal [supercall.com] gins. Or you can just settle for a bottle of New Amsterdam.
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(Score: 2) by LaminatorX on Thursday August 30 2018, @08:18PM
New Amsterdam is not quite good enough (for me) to drink straight, but it's head and shoulders above the really cheap stuff for martinis, G&T, gimlets, etc.
Even the more expensive gins ring up far below where comparable-quality whiskeys do though (thankfully :) ).
(Score: 5, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 30 2018, @03:22PM (1 child)
I expect their product to taste almost, but not quite, entirely unlike Whiskey.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday August 30 2018, @03:43PM
Good enough for Grandpa Rick *burp*
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Thursday August 30 2018, @03:30PM (1 child)
Still, it won't compare to Scotty's bottle of very very very old Scotch ... whisky [youtube.com]!
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Informative) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Thursday August 30 2018, @04:42PM
No but if they want it's.... green. [youtube.com]
This sig for rent.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday August 31 2018, @01:10AM
Wedding, blood, screaming and dying.
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(Score: 2) by captain normal on Friday August 31 2018, @03:18AM (3 children)
Maker's Mark is Bourbon, not Scotch. And Scotch is best straight, no ice, no water.
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Friday August 31 2018, @02:57PM (2 children)
a) Bourbon is Scotch.
b) "Maker's Mark is Bourbon, not Scotch" is whine.
c) Bourbon is best over ice, drunk (pun intended) before the ice melts. Warm booze is despicable.
d) So there
e) nyah
f) phbbbt
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Friday August 31 2018, @06:14PM (1 child)
http://mentalfloss.com/article/30278/what%E2%80%99s-difference-between-scotch-whiskey-and-bourbon [mentalfloss.com]
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Friday August 31 2018, @08:47PM
There are differences between all kinds of scotches. You're not succeeding in your position.