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New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

ethz.ch

61–70 of 263 posts

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From alcohol, I love: - drinking it: I really enjoy the feeling of just ingesting beer, wine or spirits, especially with friends or family - having a nice buzz from it. However, those two things are, for me, incompatible. If I start drinking a little bit, I usually don't stop until I'm way beyond the "nice buzz". As the joke goes, "one beer is not enough, two beers are just enough, three beers really aren't enough".…

Sounds like maybe the "alcohol free"/"0.0%" beer (not really 100% alcohol free) is something you should try. Tastes and looks like beer, but doesn't come with the buzz (which is the thing that your brain hooks into and uses to tell you it isn't enough yet).

> Tastes and looks like beer

I have tried almost every major non-alcoholic beer in the U.S., and none of them truly taste exactly like beer.

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#62
post #53

I wonder how that would affect the calories of the alcohol. Apparently the ethanol gets broken down into acetic acid, which I believe can't be digested further? Does that mean you also wouldn't gain weight when drinking dry beer or wine? EDIT: Apparently acetic acid _does_ have calories. Didn't know that.

Interesting question!

From this article[0] it seems ~60% of the calories in lager come from the alcohol - presumably ~40% come from carbohydrates. And from Google, acetic acid is 349 kcal / 100g, versus pure ethanol at 700 kcal / 100g. So if this approach converted 100% of alcohol to acetic acid, you'd drop the calories from lager by ~30% overall. To your question, dry wine or lower-carb beer would be proportionally even better.

The flip-side of this is perhaps consumption of too much acetic acid! It's impossible to calculate potential toxicity without understanding the strength of the acetic acid generated, though.

[0] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/331119759_Nutrition...

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#63

> In the future, people who take the gel could reduce the harmful and intoxicating effects of alcohol. I understand harm reduction but what is the point of reducing the intoxicating effects of alcohol? What's the point?

To enjoy consuming alcoholic drinks without being intoxicated?

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people are uncomfortable with you not drinking, that's very much on them

Agreed. And ideally that shouldn't matter. But in the real world there are other consequences and side effects. Maybe I don't want to make them uncomfortable. Maybe I just don't want to deal with the nagging, "busting my chops", or the questions about why I'm not drinking. Maybe I want to avoid some preconceived notions certain people may have about people who don't drink. So even if it's on them, there are still per…

I encountered a lot of peer pressure to drink when I was in college. (I didn't drink much because a lot of alcohol makes my stomach upset.)

Don't surround yourself with people who make you uncomfortable. It's a lesson I realized as I got older: It has little to do with drinking; but if the people around you make you feel uncomfortable not drinking, then you're around the wrong people.

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like maybe the "alcohol free"/"0.0%" beer (not really 100% alcohol free) is something you should try. Tastes and looks like beer, but doesn't come with the buzz (which is the thing that your brain hooks into and uses to tell you it isn't enough yet).

> Tastes and looks like beer I have tried almost every major non-alcoholic beer in the U.S., and none of them truly taste exactly like beer.

There’s a brand I’ve seen in stores called “Athletic” and it’s nearly indistinguishable

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#66

Something to sober you up if you're already drunk would be amazing, but I don't think this will do that

> Something to sober you up if you're already drunk would be amazing ... But it's the fun of alcohol! What'd be amazing would be something that really works against the headaches and/or prevent vomiting. Basically something for the next day or even the next two days (when you get old, if you party too hard it can take two days to feel good again: I hate it so at 50 I very rarely party hard anymore: maybe once a year)…

> maybe once a year

you sure you didn't just lower your tolerance?

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Something to sober you up if you're already drunk would be amazing ... But it's the fun of alcohol! What'd be amazing would be something that really works against the headaches and/or prevent vomiting. Basically something for the next day or even the next two days (when you get old, if you party too hard it can take two days to feel good again: I hate it so at 50 I very rarely party hard anymore: maybe once a year)…

> maybe once a year you sure you didn't just lower your tolerance?

Your tolerance naturally changes as you get older and the hangovers last longer.

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#68
post #53

I wonder how that would affect the calories of the alcohol. Apparently the ethanol gets broken down into acetic acid, which I believe can't be digested further? Does that mean you also wouldn't gain weight when drinking dry beer or wine? EDIT: Apparently acetic acid _does_ have calories. Didn't know that.

> Apparently acetic acid _does_ have calories. Didn't know that.

Calories are measured by burning the substance. While it very precisely determines contained energy in the physics sense, it's a question whether all that energy is used by digestion? Especially if it's something the body treats as a toxin and wants to remove as soon as possible?

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#69
I honestly don't "get" why someone would use this? It doesn't reverse intoxication, and it doesn't prevent alcohol from entering the bloodstream.

I get that alcoholic drinks taste better than their non-alcoholic counterparts (frozen margaritas are so much better than slush puppies,) but this won't prevent the buzz / intoxication.

Re: New gel breaks down alcohol in the body

#70

Something to sober you up if you're already drunk would be amazing, but I don't think this will do that

> Something to sober you up if you're already drunk would be amazing ... But it's the fun of alcohol! What'd be amazing would be something that really works against the headaches and/or prevent vomiting. Basically something for the next day or even the next two days (when you get old, if you party too hard it can take two days to feel good again: I hate it so at 50 I very rarely party hard anymore: maybe once a year)…

> But it's the fun of alcohol!

Meh, I like wine more and more and being drunk less and less, one is seriously limiting the other :)

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