My favorite origin story for the sauce is that it was misheard, originally called alla vacca. Vacca translates to cow, referring to the heavy cream and butter you add to a simple tomato sauce. Italy isn't really known for it's vodka industry after all.
Well yeah people in Italy drank gin. Vodka wasn’t big anywhere but Poland/Russia/surrounding countries until pretty recently. Cuz it’s got no flavour and modern people don’t wanna taste their alcohol as much (that’s an opinion)
@@krusher181 vodka is the king of mixed drinks... you can mix it with anything and it barely changes the flavor like orange juice, apple juice, etc.. But yeah it has little flavor i think the US just loves all booze.
I'm a physical chemist. You did a great job on your explanation of the science of water-ethanol solutions. For anyone who is curious about some real nitty gritty: ethanol and water form what's called an azeotrope at around 91-96% abv. This means at these concentrations the boiling point of the solution is lower than the individual boiling point of either of its components individually. If you are interested in evaporation in general there are two models that are pretty interesting. They are Henry's Law and Raoult's law. Hope this sparks some curiosity!
I like alcohols superior ability to extract flavors from ingredients. As well as the ability to add significant depth of flavor that seems to hold onto your tounge. I typically cook with bourbon if I'm using an alcohol to cook with. I think I even found the best cooking bourbon! Old grand dad bonded bourbon. It's really cheap and tastes like it on the finish when sipping neat (I don't recommend for sipping) but the flavor profile of the whiskey is the baking spices type bourbon flavors. Which I find preferable to the fruity ones that taste like medicinal cherry. It's also bonded, so it's 100proof, which to me means more flavor. And being bonded it's at least 4 years old, so it's carrying in some character, enough to have that lingering thing going on the palate. And its bad aftertaste gets "lost in the sauce" so to speak. The way I use it in my cooking is to cut the acidity of the vinegar, reducing or negating my need to add a pinch or 2 of sugar to compensate. Goes great in a tomato basil sauce balanced with balsamic!
I would guess that is the reason why the most concentrated commonly affordable ethanol is 190 proof...since that is almost as concentrated as one can get it via ordinary distillation? (I read that the azeotrope forms at just over 191.2 proof.)
@@brandonhoffman4712 a fun thing you can do with whisk(e)y is tilt your glass and smell at the top of the rim of the glass and then at the bottom of the rim of the glass. You should get the fruitier smelling esters at the top and the heavier molecules responsible for flavors like vanilla and chocolate at the bottom. Thank you for the cooking recommendation!
Ethan - this new explainer format that you’re doing (like you did for vanilla and Parmesan Reggiano) is everything I’ve ever wanted. I would watch a whole channel of just THAT. Thank you for the efforts!
A little more focus on which ones of the good ones are better/best and why, and less of the "this one is the worst and this is the second worst". Also less focus on did you taste which ones were which accurately. So 2 points I came away from this video wondering: in the first round with the different amounts of vodka, was the 1% better than the 0%? and in the last round, would weaker Mezcal be better than the Gin?
Watch Good Eats, Alton Brown's intellectual child. He breaks stuff down even on scales like this, but makes it so enjoyable, even I watched when I was like 8.
some olive oil is better than none for the same reason vodka is; it allows fat-soluble compounds to be dissolved like ethanol allows alcohol-soluble ones to. other than that though, I can't say, I don't know my olive oils well enough to judge taste.
Here’s a hint… The cheap stuff is fake. The second hint is probably… Just because it’s expensive doesn’t mean that it’s real, either. But don’t quote me on the second part.
@@BeardedDragonMan1997it’s tonight because America has different laws regarding what “extra virgin” olive oil is. A bunch of stuff is added to US olive oil since it isn’t regulated like it is in Italy and stuff.
for cooking it doesn't make a lot of difference, use the expensive one (ie the aop 15-20€/L) for eating raw and the inexpensive one (regular extra virgin 5-8€/L) for cooking
Gin is basically just vodka with juniper berries and sometimes other stuff added to it. I love it for vodka recipes, especially vodka pasta. Also, the longer you cook it for, the more alcohol you can add without it being bitter. I add quite a bit into the sauce and cook it very slowly for an hour or more before adding the cream
Baiju is too. Except instead of juniper, it's going down a fruity floral direction with whatever they put in there. Bought some once for the cool ceramic bottle with Chinese vibes. Can't think of a food it would work in? Maybe a ponzu sauce?
@@anonymoose2474 Not always, let me explain to you smth: rectified alcohol causes stomach pain, no matter what you ate prior and how much alcohol you took, distilled alcohol - everything is fine, less hangover. Then i read your comment saying gin is just vodka, wut? there are so many nuances to all of this!!! Why do i have to explain it to you?
@@sadmoneysoulja gin is literally vodka with juniper berries. What nuances do you need to explain, cause you havent explained dick so far, and drop the condescending tone
I've never seen someone mix the vodka in the sauce before cooking. I've always added the vodka after sautéing the onions, garlic, and tomato paste. The alcohol is supposed to help scrape up any delcious caramelized bits from the pan before it quickly burns off. Then i add the canned tomatoes and cream after.
Exactly. I use about two shots of good vodka at the deglazing stage and then simmer the tomato sauce, before adding the cream and cheese. Before adding those I’ll add a shot to the sauce and simmer for about 3-5 minutes then add the cream and cheese
Really love the channels pivot to more food sciencey content, especially appreciate the practicality of your experiments. this type of content is not being made elsewhere and is genuinely helpful for home cooks
I had vodka pasta at a restaurant with my wife and I thought it was just okay. We both agreed that gin would probably be better due to the flavors. Great to see that you thought gin was the better option too.
This is probably the first time when I’m not very satisfied with testing methodic. The best tasting recipe had different time when you introduce alcohol - it is used to deglaze tomato paste, not after you add cream. And here I’m pretty sure it makes significant difference. I definitely could smell fruity aroma of deglazed tomato paste. Also, that recipe included significantly more alcohol (I’d say about 6-8%), because it was introduced earlier and most of it was evaporated. Maybe I’ll try to make pasta alla vodka without alcohol some time to taste the difference for myself
This was my thought as well. I get that you'd kind of need a very rigorous test kitchen to make a bunch of these at the same time in the same way, just with more or less vodka addd at that point. Having tried this with a few different spirits, Brandy is the best for my tastes. Also using 20-40% by weight cherry tomatoes for more pectin and intensity of flavour.
Yes, I don't understand why he did it this way. I've not seen any pasta alla vodka recipes that just simply add it at the end like this. Don't know why he's done this. I want to see him do this again with deglazing the pan and cooking it off at the right time...
Seems like deglazing with alcohol may help carmilization. I would also add a sauce that contains parmesan cheese in it or other dry difficult to mix non homogenized fat in it may change the end effect. I'm allergic to dairy now, so I can never answer this question. Maybe he will do a follow-up.
I think one thing missed in this experiment is that the timing of when you add the vodka to the sauce matters. In vodka sauce you’re adding at after frying off the tomato paste with the onion, which exposes the ethanol more directly to the tomato/onion and cooks off much faster. Also, because I’m weird I use dry vermouth in cooking where you’re not wanting the flavor of the alcohol and you’re just wanting the benefit that the ethanol brings to the party.
vodka basically has NO flavor except the ethanol. Ethanol and alcohol are kind of the same thing, so I can't imagine that vermouth is going to be different. Vermouth is explicitly flavored with herbs and roots. So it's going to confuse things.
The alcohol ends the frying prosses and locks in the flavors of the onions, garlics, and for you tomato paste. You naturally go on to boil away the alcohol.
This has to be my favorite cooking / science related RUclips channel. You do such an amazing job at making science fun and practical while still extrapolating enough data to make our brains work a little. Bravo man really I aspire to incorporate this type of content into my normal day to day life, thanks again!
I’ve always been skeptical of vodka pasta but since I don’t keep vodka at home never tried it, but often make “vodka style” sauce with no booze. Glad to see I wasn’t missing much if anything!
The way I learned to make it is you flambé the garlic and onions with the vodka which helps caramelize them. Does it actually help the taste? I dunno, I would assume not, but maybe the varied heat concentration could make some new flavors.
I really enjoy the blind taste test videos to try and compare the flavors with out the influence of reading a label. Super interesting to see you piece together your impressions and often bring them in line accurately.
I highly recommend trying it at home sometime even if it's just 1 dish vs 1. It's really interesting to try and just focus on the flavors of a dish without actually looking at what you are eating!
@@EthanChlebowski I completely agree! The only "beef" I have with it is that your opinion may be altered by trying a "stronger" element before going onto a "weaker" one. Just like going for a roquefort cheese before trying out a bleu d'auvergne. Both are blue cheeses but you won't know which one tastes better if you eat them in the "wrong" order.
Why pallet cleanse at the end? I thought the initial test was biased because One percent was after four. It's easy to say zero would have perceived bitterness after tasting four. Bummed out to see the variable changed so late in the test
One thing to add, as the amount of ethanol evaporated doesnt just depend on the amount of ethanol added prior to cooking, you might actually end up with similar alcohol concentrations despite starting with different amounts - if the cooking time is long enough.
In Germany a similar sauce is often used in greek restaurants. It is made with Metaxa, a greek brandy, tomatos, butter, cream and often bell peppers and/or champignons. The brandy adds a very nice taste to the sauce.
@@claytonstacey Yeah that hurt a bit lol. I was hoping he'd delve into vapor pressure and why adding a volatile compound would increase the evaporation of other volatiles because distillation is super cool, but that's too far in the weeds for a cooking video
@@David_Spector27 my biochemistry degree is very-well aged and my moderate alcohol intake over the decades may have extracted some of my memories.... but am I recalling correctly that the mixture of alcohol and water boil at a different temperature than either alone?
@@bryanballot5684 Yup you are exactly correct, that's actually part of the principle distilleries work off of! Similairly, adding ethanol to food will decrease the boiling points of the volatile esters and flavor molecules, increasing their vapor pressure and the number of taste receptor collisions. Super cool stuff!
@@claytonstacey nah, as a professional chemist, I nodded with “yep, they’re both dominated by the alcohol functional group.” In the world of food chemistry, sugar and ethanol are more similar than most components of a dish.
I love the way you planned and documented this whole thig out. Here is my thoughts though, I think the alcohol might best be added while cooking down the onions, garlic, and red pepper flakes in the butter. The reason for that is those are probably the biggest flavor notes you have in the sauce and that might be the best time to add the new flavors of gin into the sauce. I will try this next time I have some gin! Thinking Bombay sapphire east might be the best, because of its additional black pepper and lemongrass flavors. Would love to see a video of you testing this theory out! Would be more work, but might be worth it.
Your supposed to add it once you cook off some of the raw tomato paste. I appreciate his videos but sometimes he does the testing applications so wrong
Yea if u had the paste all on the onions and stuff in the pan get a fond started add in vodka deglaze cook off most of it then cook the sauce cooking off most of it I’m guessing it would be mostly distilled water left carrying the flavors
Ethan+Ethanol=Perfect Pasta! I think an interesting aspect of adding any type of ethanol is that certain flavours are alcohol soluble, rather than water soluble. Aspects of garlic are noticeably different to me depending on whether wine or vodka is added. Other flavours are fat soluble, whilst some may be be both, and will yield different results. I tend to notice the notes of bay leaf and fennel seed when I use wine or vodka in my sauce.
this might be the solution for me since i rarely taste the garlic in my food anymore even if i use like a whole head to tomato sauce, and i'm huge garlic head so it's a bummer. have been searching for a way to enhance the flavour of garlic in my food for a minute. thanks!
@@Nakkiteline Wishing you satisfactory results, and more garlic flavour! I think the sweetness of the wine I add really brings out more of garlic's potential. I find I prefer red with meat or Bolognese, and white without.
@@zoulzopan it's the favourite spice of my family and we kinda have over used it ina way that i don't recognice it any more that well and if i do it's completely overpowering for other people :D
I’ve enjoyed your more straight-up, “Make XYZ food and here’s how and why you should do it,” for a while now, but I feel like you’re really finding your unique creative voice with these recent “what’s the deal with X?” videos over the last few months. Keep it up!
I have been using beer, r/w wine and cider in my cooking so far, but Pasta alla Gin sounds like something I have to try now. Considering I love gin(&tonic) and the flavor of juniper and coriander in food, I don't know why I didn't try this before. Great video, I love how in-depth you went and how you analyzed the different modes of flavor. Have a like and subscribe.
I love how well thought out your deep dives are. And don't worry about how long these vids are bc the people that are watching these are into what you're testing and not just for people looking for a recipe. I really don't want you to leave anything out hence why these need to be longer than some other vids, Thanks again Ethan for these great vids.
I might be a weirdo, but I find alcoholic cider to be a good fit for tomato sauces. One of the best baked pasta dishes I've ever made had a large splash of dry yuzu cider in it -- certainly acidic, but very fresh and fragrant :3 Loved this video!
oh my god im gonna have to try this! i put apple cider vinegar in my red sauces, so i could see how a cider would provide that same bite and acidic with a little kick!
I was at a friend’s place and once didn’t have White Wine for Bolognese and ran cider instead. I have made a full time switch from white wine to cider - although living in the U.K., which has less sweet more sour tomatoes due to the lack of sunshine/greenhouses, that extra sweetness from the cider balances out the U.K. tomatoes.
I'm not sure if it's just your editing and you're fooling us all, but damn - I'm always really impressed by your taste buds. That's kind of a weird thing to say, but it really gives you quite a lot of credibility. I'm impressed.
@@biggu3257 I'm assuming it's the verbiage of the "flavored with grapes" part, as wine is made directly from grapes, not used in any type of flavoring process.
I always thought using vodka for cooking was an odd choice because vodka is made to taste like nothing. When making cocktails you add vodka so there's that ethanol kick rather than changing flavor profile. Insightful stuff and love these scientific videos :)
Yeah the only legit use case of vodka is for fried food, like british fish and chips because the vodka evaporates faster then water in the oil and so the battered fish ends up more crispy
@@valhallakombi7239 there's gonna be alcohol-soluble vitamins in some foods, especially soups. Even if the flavor doesn't change entirely there can be benefits
It's super interesting and makes a ton of sense. We all knew vodka was extremely neutral and ethanol evaporates quite a bit so that neutrality is even more tuned down. We also know it can help other flavor compounds, but it was kinda always open-ended by how much. Adding in that we know the popularizer of pasta ala vodka was intentionally trying to sell more vodka and the results all sorta fit. It makes a small change, but realistically a good pasta sauce isn't going to be turned into anything special with vodka, it just perhaps slightly changes the flavor profile a tiny bit. Also means teetotalers aren't missing out on anything in this case!
The thing that wowed me is Ethan preferred gin in his pasta, and I thought going in to this test that the combination would be simply abhorrent! I mean, I like gin, but I never thought making my pasta sauce taste like a Christmas tree would improve anything!
Mhh I'm not convinced by the experiment because I would certainly not add vodka to the finished product even with intent to cook down further. To my knowledge vodka is usually added early on, with the tomato paste into garlic and onion but before tomatoes. The idea is that it gives the opportunity for solvating flavour compounds and reacting with them before adding wet mass in the form of tomatoes that will prevent alcohol evaporation.
the order that I would do it in: sautee garlic, onion, chilli flakes add tomato paste, mix it in and let it heat up for 1-2 minutes. I find this step reduces unpleasant flavours from cheap tomato paste that I buy add vodka to dissolve and collect the paste before it burns. wait for ~half of the liquid to evaporate add tomatoes and continue as in the video with the cream/butter/blending
I was hoping he would address that in the video, that was my understanding too. Makes me want to test that myself (same amount of vodka added at different stages of cooking).
The flavor in tomatoes is alcohol soluble. You need to add it in with the tomatoes. Not at the end, though. Maybe deglaze, then immediately add the tomatoes while most of it is still there.
10:10 I usually add the vodka before the cream, which means that depending on the quantity and heat, it would need up to 15-20 minutes until the consistency is right, and fall rather under the first category. I do it like this, since the theory I heard is that the alcohol washes out flavor components from the tomatoes that otherwise can't be tasted, so obviously this can only happen before blending, and it has to be done with whole tomatoes or tomato chunks, not blended sauce. Also, since I cook it that long and usually cook a whole pot, even adding like 100ml of Vodka doesn't make the final sauce noticeably bitter at all. It is a heavy hitting dish that goes strong on flavors, so I would recommend using a lot of pepper, cream and cheese.
Very interesting. I think this would NOT be the case for myself. My hypothesis is that San Marzano tomatoes were to blame for the lack of significant change on the sauce taste. I live in Argentina, we grow tomatoes here, and imports are scarce and expensive so I always make tomato sauce with home grown tomates. They are WAY more watery and acidic, so they require a different treatment, I go low and slow until they start to have that sweetness that we all know and love (no sugar nor baking soda btw, that's quite common here but I don't do that). In my experience vodka was an ABSOLUTE GAME CHANGER. Like.. head and shoulders ahead from my regular sauce, particularly the sweetness that it provides. I think for me it's about reason #2. Cooking alcohol to make alcohol molecules bound with something on my tomatoes to make them sweeter, which your San Marzano sauce didn't need. Just a food for thought after a thought for food. I'll definitely execute the experiment at home to really test it. Cheers and great content, thank you.
I'm using Sake in nearly every cooked dish. I learned this in Japanese recipes that very often use Sake, Soy sauce and Mirin. This also works in other dishes like italian recipes and elevates any flavor. Sake itself has no unpleasant taste of its own and the alcohol content should be minimal due to boiling.
i love stuff like this, using similar ingredients in different cuisines, like i've never been much a fan of worcestershire sauce cause i don't like the tangyness of the tamarind most of the time, but i have been using fish sauce in its place in stuff like meatloaf and beef stew and it kicks, also i use seasoned rice wine vin for any vinegar application thats not cleaning or balsamic and like, for stuff like coleslaw, potato salad, i can't imagine using anything else, it's not what my mom would have picked, but she loves my cooking too
The blind testing was super interesting, but I would have loved if you tried the sauces you found similar after each other and tried to identify differences. That would have been helpful to actually see if the alcohol changes the flavor.
Anytime I make any kind of tomato based sauces, I always add about half a tablespoon of vodka when adding the room temperature tomatoes. That way the alcohol has a little time to extract the alcohol soluble flavors before it starts to evaporate.
Fun experiments! If you're looking for part 2, I'd be curious to see if alcohol works better in dishes where you don't have the fats pulling double-duty as a solvent for non-polar molecules. (i.e. using alcohol in something with less butter & heavy cream)
There is a fourth use case for cooking with alcohol. Since it evaporates at a lower temp than water you can add fluid for coatings and mixing that shows up less in the final product. Thicker sauces, crispier fried breading, etc.
I actually like the taste of Brandy in a creamy tomato soup. I think the sweet offsets the bitter well enough and the heat of the alcohol (and a bit of cayenne) makes it very warm going down on a cold day. I could see how it might be weird with pasta though.
Good test. Shame whiskey was left out of this as it's one of the best. I almost never use Vodka to cool as it's too neutral. Whine, Whiskey, Tequila. I want to try gin now also as it looks great.
Pretty cool taste test! I think especially interesting to find that gin could be the best tasting. It sort of opens up a treasure trove for experimentation, since gins can vary so much in the botanicals used.
Yes, as a non food scientist that is a different kind of scientist, I can confirm many of us turn into the equivalent of a food scientist in the kitchen, lol it goes both ways. Science is science and once it gets into a person, it gets into all aspects of the person.
Looking at this from a hobby chemist point of view, i suspect the ethanol itself isnt really adding much flavor but is instead acting as a solvent, dissolving different compounds from the ingredients and allowing them to react with each other forming new flavors. Cooking is just very specialized organic chemistry 😆
It's been said ad nauseum....but this little series and episodes in this format have been pretty fantastic from vanilla, tomatoes, this episode, etc. Really enjoy them and it seems like you enjoy making them. Looking forward to what else you think to test and compare.
Ethan, your videos are truly exceptional. I've been a fan since your early days and it's clear to see why your reach has expanded so much. Your content fills a lot of gaps in my knowledge of food and is incredibly informative. Keep up the great work!
I can't believe you didn't use red wine !!! It has the most flavonoids of all alcohols and adds the most depth of flavor to any tomato based pasta dish. It's the most common alcohol used by Italians everywhere. It's not even a close comparison to any other alcohol. Also, white wine for any garlic based white pasta sauce! Great experiment as always, Ethan.
I was wondering the same thing. The deeper taste of the red wine is a time-tested winner in tomato-based sauces, and makes me wonder about the role of the tannins in creating a more umami taste. White wine would just put the fruit of the grape and its tones (in this taste taste citrus, which seems too acid) with the fruit of the tomato (which is really an acidy fruit).
I think red wine is kind of a "given" for tomato sauces. If an Italian red sauce calls for alcohol, 90% of the time it's gonna be red wine. I think this experiment was more about less obvious cooking alcohol choices (along with white wine since it's almost never used in tomato-based dishes).
Fantastic video. Former restaurant person here. First off, there's a lot (potentially) going on chemically; for example, depending on cooking temps, some things might reach their Maillard Reaction temperatures (browning, caramelization) etc., which could influence final flavors, depending on the point at which alcohol was added. By adding it at a relatively low-temperature moment in the recipe, I wonder to what extent things might have been altered vs. adding it early. This felt like cooking Manderin but adding mirin at the very end, which (in my experience, at least) is a mistake, because one wants the sugars to convert to caramels and one wants to boil off most of the alcohol during cooking (although it's a tricky balance, because once it's in the wok, scraping the fond into the dish while on high temps until the moisture content drops enough is quite necessary to prevent harsh notes). I suspect the white-wine version would've been significantly upgraded if the wine was added with the butter and onions early, for example, but I'm not as convinced that the gin would've worked as well (very little sugar to work with, and who knows what bitters might result from floral / pine compounds reaching higher heat). It also makes me think that perhaps one area that somebody oughtta try making a product for the trade is in extracts for certain aromatics that we wouldn't normally want to drink; for example, oregano or thyme. It looks like, from a cursory search of the Internet, that this is a thing already (found "Extracts by Annie" on Etsy, for example) and I immediately wondered, "hey, how much of thyme's notes will be preserved; is this even vaguely going to carry the notes of fresh thyme", since fresh thyme is one of those things that I, like most people, only buy at home when I know a dish won't be right with the dried version. But this is an interesting theory: an Italian restaurant could use such extracts to cut down on prep-processing time and improve consistency while achieving A+ depths of flavor. One wonders if Olive Garden's test kitchen has tried this out (and if so, if they'd be willing to talk about it on the record). There are some other serious questions there, largely revolving around what would happen chemically as the flavenoids and other aromatic compounds were released (like, is it like mirin, where sooner is better... or is this something where it's better-used when temperatures won't permit much Maillard).
A worthy question. My guess is that your theories are already in practice at an industrial level (large-scale food manufacture) where extracts in bulk are likely more easily worked with than whole ingredients. Like, say, ice cream making, sauce sold by the can in many places, etc. Also, your theories on efficiency and consistency sound a lot like what many bartenders/mixologists do. If you want to make a drink with thyme flavoring I'll bet that an extract or infusion from fresh thyme would work great. Might not be the same as fresh (like, say, muddled thyme in a cocktail) but it would have its own merits and might actually make for better consistency, mouthfeel (no solid ingredients or pieces), more practicality with shelf life and storage, etc.
@@madtonesbr Yeah, I presume large companies doing industrial-level stuff (Campbell's, for example) have probably tested a lot of these things, and there are probably some expert-level books on this material out there where I can't follow the biochemistry, lol. Probably extracts of some of these things are harder to achieve than, "throw in booze, wait" and it's either impractical or expensive vs. simply throwing in measured amounts of raws. But it's interesting to think about how extracts could be applied in ways to achieve better palate notes or at least more consistency for diners' experiences, especially for those midrange chains where that's so important (Olive Garden, Applebees, Qdoba, etc.). One imagines professional tasters evaluating "sauce base no 39" where the key note is 120-day aged Moroccan thyme extract, lol.
2:19 here's how I satuee onions. 2tbs butter melted, chop/slice the onions and toss in. salt. let the water evaporate, and once they take on some nice color add in 1/2 cup of Marsala wine. reduce wine to a thick sauce that will coat the back of a spoon. serve.
I think this confirmed my initial thoughts about cooking, that it really does not matter how closely you follow a recipe. I used to measure exactly how much wine or vodka I put in dishes, but it looks like you can be off by like a factor of 2 in either direction and it's not going to make a difference. Pretty much salt and sugar are the only things which really matter that you're somewhat close, but ironically recipes rarely tell you how much of those to put and instead just say: add until you like it, which is probably way more accurate than any recipe can get.
This was a fascinating taste-test. Thank you Ethan! On the subject of adding subtle flavors & aromas to cooked food with alcohol, it'd be really cool if you'd run this back with a few more spirits known for their distinct flavor/aroma profiles, namely: Sherries - (Oloroso, amontillado, and a PX for intense fruity sweetness) Whiskies - (Bourbon, a sherried scotch, and a peated scotch for the content) All of these should have quite the distinct effect on the sauce flavor, and are my preferred spirits for adding dimension to food!
Yes! I was just about to ask why no casked/aged spirits such as Brandy or Whisk(e)y, and also why not Rum? Rum has a sugar base and has a lot of "funk" to it, so that would change the flavor profile a lot.
I've always known to cook my chopped or whole tomatoes in the vodka first while making vodka sauce as it'll draw out the sweetness of the tomatoes. So I'd be curious as how the sauce would taste vs this method of first cooking a mother sauce then adding vodka to it. Instead of making the sauce with vodka from the start after sautéing the onions and garlic, adding the tomatoes then your vodka into it and letting it cook down.
even though this obviously isn't a 100% accurate and objective experiment, it's really cool that you did it. I always wondered what was the deal with adding wine or other types of alcohol to food.
One day I was cooking and we were out of vodka, so I decided to try our gin instead. I've never gone back! The herbaceous notes just adds such a nice, light complexity. Welcome to the pasta al gin train!
Rising up to rival Alton Brown’s science informed cooking. At this point, I’ve learned about as much from Ethan as from Alton. Thank you, Ethan, for working so hard to test and communicate the foundational variables of cooking!!
Alton got too far up his own ass. Also, he tried to claim that American GIs taught Koreans how to make fried chicken..a dish they've been making for about 500 years...
These videos are remarkably well made and edited, it’s clear you put many hours into each one. I am genuinely amazed! Thank you for producing such incredible content, it is appreciated!
This was so interesting! I love cooking with alcohol. I normally add wine or beer into many dishes I make. I even add tequila to some things. I've never used mezcal but I love smoky stuff so I could see this being amazing. The thought of using gin really peaked my curiosity and I could see those herbal notes being great in a pasta. Or even other dishes! Thank you so much. Now my mind is spinning how exactly I'm going to get 2% into my dishes cuz I don't measure very much stuff lol
A small detail with alcho not mentioned in your video but likely not relevant is alcho vs waters wetness. which could contribute to better spread over our tongue :) love the video keep up the amazing video's
Omg! There are extra layers of flavor to be had cooking with alcohol. So far every dish ive done it to has been awesome! I use old grand dads bonded bourbon. I use it in my tomato/basil sauce, and on my bean with bacon recipe. It definetly elevates both dishes, and i cook the alcohol out for 15 minutes or so. I would classify it non-alcoholic, but im not a professional. I do drink occasionally, for me its a zen kind of thing. Ill have a drink at the end of the week to relax and treat myself to a flavor experience. I will tend to dabble in different products looking for new experiences. Even switching types of alcohol to beer, wine, rum, tequilla, etc. Its never at the front of my mind really though, just in fleeting bits. Ill tend to go a month or two every year completley forgetting alcohol exists. Do you drink tea or coffee? Those are considered a narcotic, but i do drink a big cup of coffee everyday! Like the mandalorian says "this is the way"!
Whisk(e)y and desserts often pair well, depending on the choice of spirit. I once found myself with a bottle of Knob Creek bourbon that I didn't like to drink, but when I added it to the chocolate-graham cracker-almond base layer of a dessert bar recipe it was _amazing_ and brought black cherry and vanilla and a bit of caramel to the layer. It might be a challenge to find a good pairing for a peated Islay Scotch unless you love peat smoke, but unpeated whiskies in general should pair well with anything that isn't so powerfully flavoured that it'll overwhelm the influence of the spirit.
This is amazing, Ethan! It'd be awesome to see what's the most optimal time to cook tomatoes for / and length of cooking. What happens to the tomatoes? What's the breakdown of the different flavors depending on the heat/ingredients/time of cooking? What makes a good tomato sauce?
Great video! Wondering how stored sauces would compair since the ethanol could extract more flavour over a week or so. When I add liqueurs like cognac to creme patissier (normally ~3% abv) and taste it right away it always is pretty mediocre, but leaving it overnight in the fridge allows everything to react/extract and then it tastes much better than if it were boozeless. I may have to make some sauces now lol
Man Ethan really appreciate all the time, work and effort that goes into your videos, especially the sciency ones like this!! I know I would never go through this to find this stuff out but definitely want to know lol - appreciate you going through it for us 😂 Amazing video
I ended up doing a crazy experiment set-up with making vanilla extract using different forms of alcohol...felt like your last experiment! Between vodka, bourbon, gin, and rum--rum was the extreme winner. Adding a sweetness that smells like velvet. I appreciate your science!
I've often called booze, "cooking soap," as in it combines the fat soluble and water soluble flavors. Also, when I add alcohol, I tend to add it before I start adding water back to my sauce and I count watery vegetables and canned tomatoes and cream all as, "water." The main idea is that it works more to bind flavors if you add it soon after you've concentrated the your flavors from the onions desiccated/sauteed in butter.
I've typically used red wines, but there are so many different types (amount of tannins, sweetness, etc...) that it's really hard to predict. Then there are all the fruity alcohols (apple, lemon), herbal liqueurs (compari?) - there's even a tomato gin. So much to experiment now!
I switched from red wines to dessert/fortified wines like port or sherry, more specifically, I braise the onion and meat in it for bolognaise, So good!. :)
Год назад+5
One more big questio, how does the ordet of adding ingredients during cooking influence the final taste? I would (potentially naively) add alcohol to the pan before I add tomato and cream. That would be an interesting taste test!
I've always had the theory ppl will add alcohol to anything given the chance, even if the flavor profile doesn't change. Also, you can use a nonalcoholic substitute in a dish and the taste is often better!
I cook with non-alcoholic wine all the time because they have all the flavour compounds with no alcohol to burn off (and they're surprisingly low on calories as any sugar that would be in them has been converted to alcohol). Super tasty and no bitter notes.
So here's a thought: Would someone who drinks a lot of hard liquor have a significantly different experience? A heavy drinker might not detect bitterness in the same way. I know when I was at my worst, whisky just tasted sweet and hot without significant bitterness.
Great test tasing it raw and also cooked aswel! Good to see the alcohol less foods were the better ones, the reason why to not add alcohol into certain dishes besides red wine is explained by this video. In my opinion a great video and really valuable content, love your videos keep these up! 🔥
Yo Ethan, thanks for being a hero to the home chef. Like, truly, man. All of your videos are ACTUALLY like 5 of my own dumbass botched meals, and I still don't know what I did wrong. You are the man.
As someone who doesn't drink, I've wondered what I may be missing out on by skipping alcohol in dishes. I especially like braising, and have tried different red wine substitues several times. It is interesting to see these results. I imagine there are some alcohol analogues out there for people like me if we want to try and add flavor to our dish without adding alcohol.
There probably are other solvents that can extract tastes and then release them as a taste cloud into your mouth and nose, but then I would rather stick to the ethanol.
If you've ever eaten, say, some strawberries that were slightly overripe, you can detect an enhanced fruitiness from increased esters and very small amounts of alcohols. If you use alcoholic drinks in cooking in the proportions recommended in this video, you're not really consuming any more than that.
As always I love your dedication to the method. One thing I notice is that you should use 100g of sauce every time because you are reducing the amount of the other ingredients. That would make adding each percent of alcohol a gram, no half grams and you will have a closer final weight of each of the final products.
My favourite alcohols for cooking are whiskey/brandy (same "spectrum" - aged wood, lots of caramel flavours) and cider, which works similar to white wine. I'm glad to have found out how alcohol actually works when it comes to cooking.
You are supposed to use the vodka before the actual watery stuff (tomatoes for example). You put oil, onion and garlic with pancetta, let is cook for short time, add vodka, let it evaporate and then use the tomatoes. The food is not meant to be boozey at all.
Im going to add, that one factor that might make Vodka improve a sauce, might be in a slow cook recipe.. where the alcohol has time to create new flavor compounds. In fact, it might be interesting.. if you tested a vodka sauce that was sitting uncooked in the fridge, for like 2 days.. to see if the taste changes. When I was doing Chinese martial arts, we used a herbal solution to rub into our fists.. before hitting a wall mounted sand-bag. This was an all natural Herbal Solution, with an Alcohol base, called "Dit Da Jow" (Ditt dahh jow). They use all natural ingredients, and toss them into a Jar... and let it sit for at least 1 year. The stuff is INCREDIBLE. A drop or two.. rubbed into any swollen tissue... and the swelling will be GONE in less than 5 minutes flat! With deep tissue bruises, it will reduce the healing time, by like 70%, when applied each day. Some Chinese companies have tried to make Synthetic Jow... and I can tell you from testing it myself.. that it does not work for BEANS compared to the all-natural stuff. And in fact... A Western Scientists did a comparison of Traditional natural Jow, compared with the modern synthetics... and found that the traditional Jow had like 100 more different Compounds that had managed to form within it. It was a completely different animal. My point being.. that in "certain" instances... the longer an Alcohol has to Interact with the Ingredients the greater the possible changes to the flavor profiles, and other compounds that will be created, as a result. For example... it would be good to test a Vodka based sauce that was left uncooked in the fridge for a few days... rather than being instantly made/cooked. Then compare three differences: 1) A freshly made Vodka sauce. 2) A Vodka sauce that was left in the fridge uncooked, for at least 2 to 3 days. 3) A sauce Without the vodka in it... freshly made. 4) A sauce without Vodka, that was left in the fridge uncooked for 2 to 3 days. In other cases, flame cooking an alcohol, can also change the flavor profile. For example, when cooking Chicken Marsala.. Id see the chefs end up lighting the thing on fire, in the pan, right after it was poured in.
I worked at an ice cream shop that had a plethora of liquor flavors I don't even think it was entirely cooked off before it was churned but the bourbon was my favorite. Lick honest ice creams in Austin Texas if you want to look up their flavors
Actually, if you follow the recipe for Penne alla Vodka, the alcohol is added after the onion is well cooked and before any other ingredients and vodka is allowed to evaporate. This results in the taste of vodka and not the alcohol part.
Vodka doesn't equal vodka. The traditional vodka is made out of rye, so wheat and corn based vokas already introduce slightly different aromas. Potato based vodka, which is quite common too, also has a slightly different aroma. You might want to look into doing another "Which vodka pasta tastes best?" type of video based on the different types of vodka. ;)
An important thing to note is that Vodka is nowhere near 'flavourless' (meaning no other flavours than ethanol) as people claim. I haven't tried commercial everclear/grain alcohol, but I have distilled alcohol to 95% with a very tall reflux column. It is very truly _near_ flavourless (with a slight hint of a strange sweetness than is unique to ethanol in my experience). None of the bitterness you get from Vodka. I know that may contradict what you've read, but please try it beside grain alcohol and you will see.
The best vodkas are supposed to have as little additional flavors as possible, it should taste like water that burns and makes you drunk. That is why it is served cold, higher temperatures makes flavors more noticeable. As you said it is not flavorless but it separates good vodka from a bad one. At least that's my Polish experience of it. Best vodkas I drank were extremely smooth, almost flavorless with a little hint of grain notes and barely any bitterness.
The whole tasting element of vodka is really interesting because one of the legal defining factors of vodka, at least in the US, is that it has to be distilled to 95% and then diluted to whatever proof you want with water afterwards. Despite that fact plenty of vodkas do have obviously different flavors. I haven't actually ever heard where those flavor differences are supposed to come from exactly. You can tell that vodka retains far less of the flavor compounds of the original mash however if you were to compare a corn vodka to a unaged bourbon also distilled from corn but to a much lower end ABV. I'm have very few opinions on vodka, I don't hate it but don't love it either. Unaged bourbon very much is not my thing at all, it has a bizarre sweet "corny" flavor that I absolutely do not like.
@@huckthatdish I'd also assume ethanol binds some flavor molecules that are hard to separate and I don't think it's even a good idea to do so. Pure ethanol doesn't taste great and drinking something that tastes like diluted nail polish remover is not preferable. In Poland and other EU countries we make vodkas mainly from grains (wheat, rye, barley) and potatoes from 96% alcohol and it must contain no less than 37.5%. Each have distinct taste although very subtle. Because of this lower limit classic żubrówka with its slightly yellow tint and distinct taste is still considered a vodka. But even though they differ a bit I still wouldn't consider them good option for cooking. Wine, brandy, sherry, rum and even whisky have a lot more distinct flavors to bring to a dish than a vodka that is supposed to be as neutral as possible. Even if pure ethanol slightly elevates the flavor it doesn't seem to be worth a hassle when you can add wine and introduce sweetness and fruitiness and make while still getting that 1% uplift from its alcohol content.
@@afgncap oh yeah wasn’t arguing it’s good for cooking. (Outside of batters for frying. You don’t want any flavor from it at all in that case, you just want lower boiling point for crispier crust so you really do just want ethanol and as few flavor compounds as possible.)
What I have learned is that in making the pasta from scratch, adding a part of vodka to the egg and flour mixture helps with mixing without activating so much gluten as adding water would
GIN could virtually be considered a type of “vodka”, given the flavoured vodkas they do have places like Russia and Poland. Very strong, delicious and not shy of adding some botanical ingredients. And the traditional foil of Russian vodka is not a juice chaser, but a snack like a salted pickle.
I find that DRINKING alcohol first, and THEN eating anything, makes it taste WONDERFUL! You can see me prove it on my channel. LOL
🤣
That typically works too lol.
Try smoking a joint first too!
@@mummer7337 But I am at wortk :( Beer it is ig xDD
@@EthanChlebowski As a brewer and foodie, I have lots of experience with this. Thanks for the response, Ethan. You rock!
My favorite origin story for the sauce is that it was misheard, originally called alla vacca. Vacca translates to cow, referring to the heavy cream and butter you add to a simple tomato sauce. Italy isn't really known for it's vodka industry after all.
i could definitely see that, thats pretty interesting
Well yeah people in Italy drank gin. Vodka wasn’t big anywhere but Poland/Russia/surrounding countries until pretty recently.
Cuz it’s got no flavour and modern people don’t wanna taste their alcohol as much (that’s an opinion)
@@krusher181 vodka is the king of mixed drinks... you can mix it with anything and it barely changes the flavor like orange juice, apple juice, etc.. But yeah it has little flavor i think the US just loves all booze.
that’s really cool actually
Lmao, I think the ones who read "vodka" are just coping when they say it taste good
I'm a physical chemist. You did a great job on your explanation of the science of water-ethanol solutions. For anyone who is curious about some real nitty gritty: ethanol and water form what's called an azeotrope at around 91-96% abv. This means at these concentrations the boiling point of the solution is lower than the individual boiling point of either of its components individually. If you are interested in evaporation in general there are two models that are pretty interesting. They are Henry's Law and Raoult's law. Hope this sparks some curiosity!
It did indeed sir, thank you.
I like alcohols superior ability to extract flavors from ingredients. As well as the ability to add significant depth of flavor that seems to hold onto your tounge.
I typically cook with bourbon if I'm using an alcohol to cook with. I think I even found the best cooking bourbon! Old grand dad bonded bourbon. It's really cheap and tastes like it on the finish when sipping neat (I don't recommend for sipping) but the flavor profile of the whiskey is the baking spices type bourbon flavors. Which I find preferable to the fruity ones that taste like medicinal cherry. It's also bonded, so it's 100proof, which to me means more flavor. And being bonded it's at least 4 years old, so it's carrying in some character, enough to have that lingering thing going on the palate. And its bad aftertaste gets "lost in the sauce" so to speak.
The way I use it in my cooking is to cut the acidity of the vinegar, reducing or negating my need to add a pinch or 2 of sugar to compensate. Goes great in a tomato basil sauce balanced with balsamic!
I would guess that is the reason why the most concentrated commonly affordable ethanol is 190 proof...since that is almost as concentrated as one can get it via ordinary distillation? (I read that the azeotrope forms at just over 191.2 proof.)
@@brandonhoffman4712 a fun thing you can do with whisk(e)y is tilt your glass and smell at the top of the rim of the glass and then at the bottom of the rim of the glass. You should get the fruitier smelling esters at the top and the heavier molecules responsible for flavors like vanilla and chocolate at the bottom.
Thank you for the cooking recommendation!
Do you know of a similar show to this with more focus on chemistry?
Ethan - this new explainer format that you’re doing (like you did for vanilla and Parmesan Reggiano) is everything I’ve ever wanted. I would watch a whole channel of just THAT. Thank you for the efforts!
A little more focus on which ones of the good ones are better/best and why, and less of the "this one is the worst and this is the second worst". Also less focus on did you taste which ones were which accurately. So 2 points I came away from this video wondering: in the first round with the different amounts of vodka, was the 1% better than the 0%? and in the last round, would weaker Mezcal be better than the Gin?
He's the nile red of food channels
Totally agree. I just subscribed.
Adam Ragusa?
Watch Good Eats, Alton Brown's intellectual child. He breaks stuff down even on scales like this, but makes it so enjoyable, even I watched when I was like 8.
I'd love to see a deep dive into olive oil, it's insane how cheap vs expensive you can go
some olive oil is better than none for the same reason vodka is; it allows fat-soluble compounds to be dissolved like ethanol allows alcohol-soluble ones to.
other than that though, I can't say, I don't know my olive oils well enough to judge taste.
Here’s a hint… The cheap stuff is fake. The second hint is probably… Just because it’s expensive doesn’t mean that it’s real, either. But don’t quote me on the second part.
@@JohnnyArtPavlousource
@@BeardedDragonMan1997it’s tonight because America has different laws regarding what “extra virgin” olive oil is. A bunch of stuff is added to US olive oil since it isn’t regulated like it is in Italy and stuff.
for cooking it doesn't make a lot of difference, use the expensive one (ie the aop 15-20€/L) for eating raw and the inexpensive one (regular extra virgin 5-8€/L) for cooking
Gin is basically just vodka with juniper berries and sometimes other stuff added to it. I love it for vodka recipes, especially vodka pasta. Also, the longer you cook it for, the more alcohol you can add without it being bitter. I add quite a bit into the sauce and cook it very slowly for an hour or more before adding the cream
Baiju is too. Except instead of juniper, it's going down a fruity floral direction with whatever they put in there.
Bought some once for the cool ceramic bottle with Chinese vibes. Can't think of a food it would work in? Maybe a ponzu sauce?
alcohol can be distilled and rectified, huuuge difference, be it vodka or any other style of strong beverages
@@sadmoneysoulja what does that have to do with my comment. Vodka is always rectified as far as I know, as is gin.
@@anonymoose2474 Not always, let me explain to you smth: rectified alcohol causes stomach pain, no matter what you ate prior and how much alcohol you took, distilled alcohol - everything is fine, less hangover. Then i read your comment saying gin is just vodka, wut? there are so many nuances to all of this!!! Why do i have to explain it to you?
@@sadmoneysoulja gin is literally vodka with juniper berries. What nuances do you need to explain, cause you havent explained dick so far, and drop the condescending tone
I've never seen someone mix the vodka in the sauce before cooking. I've always added the vodka after sautéing the onions, garlic, and tomato paste. The alcohol is supposed to help scrape up any delcious caramelized bits from the pan before it quickly burns off. Then i add the canned tomatoes and cream after.
Exactly. I use about two shots of good vodka at the deglazing stage and then simmer the tomato sauce, before adding the cream and cheese. Before adding those I’ll add a shot to the sauce and simmer for about 3-5 minutes then add the cream and cheese
The flavor in tomatoes is alcohol soluble, so you want to add the tomatoes before the alcohol evaporates.
Yup. We call this deglazing, and it's the main reason for using alcohol in any dish.
I was confused as well.
dafuq not red whine?
Really love the channels pivot to more food sciencey content, especially appreciate the practicality of your experiments. this type of content is not being made elsewhere and is genuinely helpful for home cooks
Adam Ragusea has these kind of experiments as well, e.g., for how adding whipped cream affects volume and taste.
Typically I'd agree, Its just a shame his methodology is wrong and the entire video kinda useless. This is not how you use vodka in pasta alá vodka.
I had vodka pasta at a restaurant with my wife and I thought it was just okay. We both agreed that gin would probably be better due to the flavors. Great to see that you thought gin was the better option too.
I'd probably try vermouth then.
Gin is always better 😅
This is probably the first time when I’m not very satisfied with testing methodic.
The best tasting recipe had different time when you introduce alcohol - it is used to deglaze tomato paste, not after you add cream. And here I’m pretty sure it makes significant difference. I definitely could smell fruity aroma of deglazed tomato paste. Also, that recipe included significantly more alcohol (I’d say about 6-8%), because it was introduced earlier and most of it was evaporated.
Maybe I’ll try to make pasta alla vodka without alcohol some time to taste the difference for myself
This was my thought as well. I get that you'd kind of need a very rigorous test kitchen to make a bunch of these at the same time in the same way, just with more or less vodka addd at that point. Having tried this with a few different spirits, Brandy is the best for my tastes. Also using 20-40% by weight cherry tomatoes for more pectin and intensity of flavour.
Yes, I don't understand why he did it this way. I've not seen any pasta alla vodka recipes that just simply add it at the end like this. Don't know why he's done this. I want to see him do this again with deglazing the pan and cooking it off at the right time...
Seems like deglazing with alcohol may help carmilization. I would also add a sauce that contains parmesan cheese in it or other dry difficult to mix non homogenized fat in it may change the end effect. I'm allergic to dairy now, so I can never answer this question. Maybe he will do a follow-up.
I would love to come back to watch a part 2 on this with the tomato sauce deglazed and more alcohol
Caramellizing anything containing ethanol evaporates it very quickly
I think one thing missed in this experiment is that the timing of when you add the vodka to the sauce matters. In vodka sauce you’re adding at after frying off the tomato paste with the onion, which exposes the ethanol more directly to the tomato/onion and cooks off much faster. Also, because I’m weird I use dry vermouth in cooking where you’re not wanting the flavor of the alcohol and you’re just wanting the benefit that the ethanol brings to the party.
vodka basically has NO flavor except the ethanol. Ethanol and alcohol are kind of the same thing, so I can't imagine that vermouth is going to be different. Vermouth is explicitly flavored with herbs and roots. So it's going to confuse things.
@@StephenHutchison right, similar to Ethan’s favorite the gin. I was more making the point that timing is more important than how much of what.
The alcohol ends the frying prosses and locks in the flavors of the onions, garlics, and for you tomato paste.
You naturally go on to boil away the alcohol.
@@MegaBanne See this would make more sense to me, like the vanilla extract the vodka could simply be used to extract flavour from the aromatics.
@@StephenHutchison Then why do vodkas taste different? is it like... different ethanol? There's gonna be something that makes them taste different.
This has to be my favorite cooking / science related RUclips channel. You do such an amazing job at making science fun and practical while still extrapolating enough data to make our brains work a little. Bravo man really I aspire to incorporate this type of content into my normal day to day life, thanks again!
I’ve always been skeptical of vodka pasta but since I don’t keep vodka at home never tried it, but often make “vodka style” sauce with no booze. Glad to see I wasn’t missing much if anything!
Yeah for me it's more an excuse to empty out the freezer of all the different vodkas I've bought over the years ...
Try pepper vodka. It's much better for sauce than regular vodka.
Honestly cooking with wine is something that you should look into though (you could have cooking wine in the fridge just as you’d have vinegar)
@@8BitNaptime I’ll take them off your hands
The way I learned to make it is you flambé the garlic and onions with the vodka which helps caramelize them. Does it actually help the taste? I dunno, I would assume not, but maybe the varied heat concentration could make some new flavors.
I really enjoy the blind taste test videos to try and compare the flavors with out the influence of reading a label. Super interesting to see you piece together your impressions and often bring them in line accurately.
I highly recommend trying it at home sometime even if it's just 1 dish vs 1. It's really interesting to try and just focus on the flavors of a dish without actually looking at what you are eating!
@@EthanChlebowski I completely agree! The only "beef" I have with it is that your opinion may be altered by trying a "stronger" element before going onto a "weaker" one. Just like going for a roquefort cheese before trying out a bleu d'auvergne. Both are blue cheeses but you won't know which one tastes better if you eat them in the "wrong" order.
Why pallet cleanse at the end? I thought the initial test was biased because One percent was after four. It's easy to say zero would have perceived bitterness after tasting four. Bummed out to see the variable changed so late in the test
@@Kodiak01 I'll take a bourbon barrel aged stout before my lager please.. This lager is too bitter and taste of bourbon I say!
@@dirtperson4221slash2 the videos edited so he probably cut out him pallet cleansing every time because it’s not Interesting to watch
One thing to add, as the amount of ethanol evaporated doesnt just depend on the amount of ethanol added prior to cooking, you might actually end up with similar alcohol concentrations despite starting with different amounts - if the cooking time is long enough.
In Germany a similar sauce is often used in greek restaurants. It is made with Metaxa, a greek brandy, tomatos, butter, cream and often bell peppers and/or champignons. The brandy adds a very nice taste to the sauce.
Vielen Dank Herr Lott
Hmm 😋 leckere Metaxasauce.
My first thought watching this video was to try it with brandy. Thank you for the tip!
Metaxa is not just Brandy though, its infused with herbs
Gyros with metaxa sauce baked in the oven with cheese... fuck me!
Ethan, as a biochemist this video really hit home with me. Anytime you namedrop a taste receptor like that I'm in heaven!
So did you cringe a little too when he said that sugar and ethanol molecules resemble each other 😂
@@claytonstacey Yeah that hurt a bit lol. I was hoping he'd delve into vapor pressure and why adding a volatile compound would increase the evaporation of other volatiles because distillation is super cool, but that's too far in the weeds for a cooking video
@@David_Spector27 my biochemistry degree is very-well aged and my moderate alcohol intake over the decades may have extracted some of my memories.... but am I recalling correctly that the mixture of alcohol and water boil at a different temperature than either alone?
@@bryanballot5684 Yup you are exactly correct, that's actually part of the principle distilleries work off of! Similairly, adding ethanol to food will decrease the boiling points of the volatile esters and flavor molecules, increasing their vapor pressure and the number of taste receptor collisions. Super cool stuff!
@@claytonstacey nah, as a professional chemist, I nodded with “yep, they’re both dominated by the alcohol functional group.” In the world of food chemistry, sugar and ethanol are more similar than most components of a dish.
I love the way you planned and documented this whole thig out. Here is my thoughts though, I think the alcohol might best be added while cooking down the onions, garlic, and red pepper flakes in the butter. The reason for that is those are probably the biggest flavor notes you have in the sauce and that might be the best time to add the new flavors of gin into the sauce. I will try this next time I have some gin! Thinking Bombay sapphire east might be the best, because of its additional black pepper and lemongrass flavors. Would love to see a video of you testing this theory out! Would be more work, but might be worth it.
This is correct, adding the alcohol after blending the sauce is missing the point.
Your supposed to add it once you cook off some of the raw tomato paste. I appreciate his videos but sometimes he does the testing applications so wrong
Yea if u had the paste all on the onions and stuff in the pan get a fond started add in vodka deglaze cook off most of it then cook the sauce cooking off most of it I’m guessing it would be mostly distilled water left carrying the flavors
Ethan+Ethanol=Perfect Pasta! I think an interesting aspect of adding any type of ethanol is that certain flavours are alcohol soluble, rather than water soluble. Aspects of garlic are noticeably different to me depending on whether wine or vodka is added. Other flavours are fat soluble, whilst some may be be both, and will yield different results. I tend to notice the notes of bay leaf and fennel seed when I use wine or vodka in my sauce.
this might be the solution for me since i rarely taste the garlic in my food anymore even if i use like a whole head to tomato sauce, and i'm huge garlic head so it's a bummer. have been searching for a way to enhance the flavour of garlic in my food for a minute. thanks!
@@Nakkiteline Wishing you satisfactory results, and more garlic flavour! I think the sweetness of the wine I add really brings out more of garlic's potential. I find I prefer red with meat or Bolognese, and white without.
@@Nakkiteline why don't you taste garlic anymore?
@@zoulzopan it's the favourite spice of my family and we kinda have over used it ina way that i don't recognice it any more that well and if i do it's completely overpowering for other people :D
Love the deep dives you've been taking in cooking, Ethan! Keep it up :D
Thank you, I've been having fun making them!
@@EthanChlebowski there is nobody like you, you create a unique type of content
I’ve enjoyed your more straight-up, “Make XYZ food and here’s how and why you should do it,” for a while now, but I feel like you’re really finding your unique creative voice with these recent “what’s the deal with X?” videos over the last few months. Keep it up!
Stop
Being
Everywhere
@@EthanChlebowski you’re only 5’6” and seem like an angry man 😂
I have been using beer, r/w wine and cider in my cooking so far, but Pasta alla Gin sounds like something I have to try now. Considering I love gin(&tonic) and the flavor of juniper and coriander in food, I don't know why I didn't try this before. Great video, I love how in-depth you went and how you analyzed the different modes of flavor. Have a like and subscribe.
I love how well thought out your deep dives are. And don't worry about how long these vids are bc the people that are watching these are into what you're testing and not just for people looking for a recipe. I really don't want you to leave anything out hence why these need to be longer than some other vids, Thanks again Ethan for these great vids.
i concur about the lenght of these deep dives. okay with everything in your post :D
I might be a weirdo, but I find alcoholic cider to be a good fit for tomato sauces. One of the best baked pasta dishes I've ever made had a large splash of dry yuzu cider in it -- certainly acidic, but very fresh and fragrant :3
Loved this video!
oh my god im gonna have to try this! i put apple cider vinegar in my red sauces, so i could see how a cider would provide that same bite and acidic with a little kick!
I have a ton of cider and might give it a shot! What else do you like to add it to?
Good suggestion.
sounds pretty good
I was at a friend’s place and once didn’t have White Wine for Bolognese and ran cider instead. I have made a full time switch from white wine to cider - although living in the U.K., which has less sweet more sour tomatoes due to the lack of sunshine/greenhouses, that extra sweetness from the cider balances out the U.K. tomatoes.
0:04 if the answer is no, you didnt add enough vodka
“Would you like some pasta with your vodka?”
I'm not sure if it's just your editing and you're fooling us all, but damn - I'm always really impressed by your taste buds. That's kind of a weird thing to say, but it really gives you quite a lot of credibility. I'm impressed.
He’s pretty darn accurate on the tests (in other videos as well). I don’t think most people would be able to distinguish flavors this well.
"Wine is primarily flavored with grapes." is a sentence that will forever haunt me.
😂
I heard people like grapes
why?
@@biggu3257 I'm assuming it's the verbiage of the "flavored with grapes" part, as wine is made directly from grapes, not used in any type of flavoring process.
🤣🤣🤣🤣
I love that he's blind tasting visually identical sauces @7:30 because you absolutely cannot see the vodka in it
Visual ethanol reaction with the fats - vodka can make it split or curdle (not that heat is a problem in the first one)
I always thought using vodka for cooking was an odd choice because vodka is made to taste like nothing. When making cocktails you add vodka so there's that ethanol kick rather than changing flavor profile. Insightful stuff and love these scientific videos :)
Yeah the only legit use case of vodka is for fried food, like british fish and chips because the vodka evaporates faster then water in the oil and so the battered fish ends up more crispy
He should've let the onions marinate with the ethanol over night to experience the unique compounds ethanol pulls out of the vegetable. face palm
@@valhallakombi7239 there's gonna be alcohol-soluble vitamins in some foods, especially soups. Even if the flavor doesn't change entirely there can be benefits
I like how the result of testing pasta ala vodka was that you don't really need to add vodka.
It's super interesting and makes a ton of sense. We all knew vodka was extremely neutral and ethanol evaporates quite a bit so that neutrality is even more tuned down. We also know it can help other flavor compounds, but it was kinda always open-ended by how much. Adding in that we know the popularizer of pasta ala vodka was intentionally trying to sell more vodka and the results all sorta fit. It makes a small change, but realistically a good pasta sauce isn't going to be turned into anything special with vodka, it just perhaps slightly changes the flavor profile a tiny bit. Also means teetotalers aren't missing out on anything in this case!
The thing that wowed me is Ethan preferred gin in his pasta, and I thought going in to this test that the combination would be simply abhorrent! I mean, I like gin, but I never thought making my pasta sauce taste like a Christmas tree would improve anything!
@@bcubed72 Exciting! I wonder how many chefs were frantically taking notes of the gin idea lol
@@bodyofhope I'm gonna at least try it once.
@@bcubed72 i mean, rosemary has pretty strong pine notes, so it's not an outrageous idea.
This format is so freaking informational and addicting to watch. Thanks for all the hard work.
Mhh I'm not convinced by the experiment because I would certainly not add vodka to the finished product even with intent to cook down further. To my knowledge vodka is usually added early on, with the tomato paste into garlic and onion but before tomatoes. The idea is that it gives the opportunity for solvating flavour compounds and reacting with them before adding wet mass in the form of tomatoes that will prevent alcohol evaporation.
the order that I would do it in:
sautee garlic, onion, chilli flakes
add tomato paste, mix it in and let it heat up for 1-2 minutes. I find this step reduces unpleasant flavours from cheap tomato paste that I buy
add vodka to dissolve and collect the paste before it burns. wait for ~half of the liquid to evaporate
add tomatoes and continue as in the video with the cream/butter/blending
I was hoping he would address that in the video, that was my understanding too. Makes me want to test that myself (same amount of vodka added at different stages of cooking).
The flavor in tomatoes is alcohol soluble. You need to add it in with the tomatoes. Not at the end, though. Maybe deglaze, then immediately add the tomatoes while most of it is still there.
These types of videos are better than 99% of the content on the Food Network. Excellent production my friend I really enjoyed this.
So the 1% would be Alton Brown.
10:10 I usually add the vodka before the cream, which means that depending on the quantity and heat, it would need up to 15-20 minutes until the consistency is right, and fall rather under the first category.
I do it like this, since the theory I heard is that the alcohol washes out flavor components from the tomatoes that otherwise can't be tasted, so obviously this can only happen before blending, and it has to be done with whole tomatoes or tomato chunks, not blended sauce.
Also, since I cook it that long and usually cook a whole pot, even adding like 100ml of Vodka doesn't make the final sauce noticeably bitter at all.
It is a heavy hitting dish that goes strong on flavors, so I would recommend using a lot of pepper, cream and cheese.
Very interesting. I think this would NOT be the case for myself. My hypothesis is that San Marzano tomatoes were to blame for the lack of significant change on the sauce taste. I live in Argentina, we grow tomatoes here, and imports are scarce and expensive so I always make tomato sauce with home grown tomates. They are WAY more watery and acidic, so they require a different treatment, I go low and slow until they start to have that sweetness that we all know and love (no sugar nor baking soda btw, that's quite common here but I don't do that). In my experience vodka was an ABSOLUTE GAME CHANGER. Like.. head and shoulders ahead from my regular sauce, particularly the sweetness that it provides. I think for me it's about reason #2. Cooking alcohol to make alcohol molecules bound with something on my tomatoes to make them sweeter, which your San Marzano sauce didn't need.
Just a food for thought after a thought for food. I'll definitely execute the experiment at home to really test it. Cheers and great content, thank you.
Did you do the experiment? If so, what happened?
sounds interesting
Wow, many interested in my pending experiment. I didn't, but I definitely will now. Expect an answer in about a month :)
@@urielchami4556 Lmao, sorry for starting it. One month, woo!
@@wanderingshade8383 hahaha sorry, i'm not in Argentina at the moment, so it's hard (impossible actually) to test
I'm using Sake in nearly every cooked dish. I learned this in Japanese recipes that very often use Sake, Soy sauce and Mirin. This also works in other dishes like italian recipes and elevates any flavor. Sake itself has no unpleasant taste of its own and the alcohol content should be minimal due to boiling.
Says you, sake has a very bitter aftertaste.
@@misterkite So my food is bitter every day? I don't think so.
i love stuff like this, using similar ingredients in different cuisines, like i've never been much a fan of worcestershire sauce cause i don't like the tangyness of the tamarind most of the time, but i have been using fish sauce in its place in stuff like meatloaf and beef stew and it kicks, also i use seasoned rice wine vin for any vinegar application thats not cleaning or balsamic and like, for stuff like coleslaw, potato salad, i can't imagine using anything else, it's not what my mom would have picked, but she loves my cooking too
I was gonna say the same. Love adding sake into dishes!
sake is discusting...im confused by the statement it has no unpleasant taste... but maybe it help cooking..
Throat mics should be considered a warcrime on people watching food videos
I agree!
😂😂
i had to keep turning down the volume
I love how Ethan methodically breaks down a problem and draws charts to clarify things. He'd make an awesome engineer. 🤠
Ethan breaks down a problem
Ethanol breaks down certain flavor compounds
A fitting symmetry.
The blind testing was super interesting, but I would have loved if you tried the sauces you found similar after each other and tried to identify differences. That would have been helpful to actually see if the alcohol changes the flavor.
Completely agree.
Anytime I make any kind of tomato based sauces, I always add about half a tablespoon of vodka when adding the room temperature tomatoes. That way the alcohol has a little time to extract the alcohol soluble flavors before it starts to evaporate.
Fun experiments! If you're looking for part 2, I'd be curious to see if alcohol works better in dishes where you don't have the fats pulling double-duty as a solvent for non-polar molecules. (i.e. using alcohol in something with less butter & heavy cream)
Mirin and sake in Japanese cooking is a good example.
Woof, it's the big chlebowski
The Gin sauce really tied the dish together.
There is a fourth use case for cooking with alcohol. Since it evaporates at a lower temp than water you can add fluid for coatings and mixing that shows up less in the final product. Thicker sauces, crispier fried breading, etc.
And then
5. It freezes at a lower temp and doesn’t permit gluten development like water does so it can be useful in cold pastries
I love your content! If you can, do one on different types of butter and if it affects taste at all!
That's pretty vague as it would need to apply to a specific dish as a control
@@Donovarkhallum like most other experiments he does…
@@Donovarkhallum butter pasta? Not hard to think of one
That sounds like a GREAT idea!
I used unsalted and salted butter in the same cookies recipe and didn't notice any difference idk how that works 🤔
I actually like the taste of Brandy in a creamy tomato soup. I think the sweet offsets the bitter well enough and the heat of the alcohol (and a bit of cayenne) makes it very warm going down on a cold day. I could see how it might be weird with pasta though.
Might be an acquired taste thing, or just preference? I personally enjoy a little bitter with sweet too
Good test. Shame whiskey was left out of this as it's one of the best. I almost never use Vodka to cool as it's too neutral. Whine, Whiskey, Tequila. I want to try gin now also as it looks great.
Pretty cool taste test! I think especially interesting to find that gin could be the best tasting. It sort of opens up a treasure trove for experimentation, since gins can vary so much in the botanicals used.
Ethan is actually really just a scientist, it just so happens that he’s also really good at cooking
Cooking is just taste-safe chemistry (so long as you don’t fuck it up too bad)
@@tamatikentwell9861 Here I am doing a chemistry course realizing I just wanted to cook.
If you can follow the instructions in organic chemistry lab, you can use a well-written recipe to cook. Same difference.
Well he prepares this recipe in a wrong way.
Yes, as a non food scientist that is a different kind of scientist, I can confirm many of us turn into the equivalent of a food scientist in the kitchen, lol it goes both ways. Science is science and once it gets into a person, it gets into all aspects of the person.
Looking at this from a hobby chemist point of view, i suspect the ethanol itself isnt really adding much flavor but is instead acting as a solvent, dissolving different compounds from the ingredients and allowing them to react with each other forming new flavors.
Cooking is just very specialized organic chemistry 😆
It's been said ad nauseum....but this little series and episodes in this format have been pretty fantastic from vanilla, tomatoes, this episode, etc. Really enjoy them and it seems like you enjoy making them. Looking forward to what else you think to test and compare.
Ethan, your videos are truly exceptional. I've been a fan since your early days and it's clear to see why your reach has expanded so much. Your content fills a lot of gaps in my knowledge of food and is incredibly informative. Keep up the great work!
I can't believe you didn't use red wine !!! It has the most flavonoids of all alcohols and adds the most depth of flavor to any tomato based pasta dish. It's the most common alcohol used by Italians everywhere. It's not even a close comparison to any other alcohol. Also, white wine for any garlic based white pasta sauce! Great experiment as always, Ethan.
"It's the most common alcohol used by Italians everywhere."
Why does that matter?
I was wondering the same thing. The deeper taste of the red wine is a time-tested winner in tomato-based sauces, and makes me wonder about the role of the tannins in creating a more umami taste. White wine would just put the fruit of the grape and its tones (in this taste taste citrus, which seems too acid) with the fruit of the tomato (which is really an acidy fruit).
@@grabble7605 probably because the video is about pasta
I think red wine is kind of a "given" for tomato sauces. If an Italian red sauce calls for alcohol, 90% of the time it's gonna be red wine. I think this experiment was more about less obvious cooking alcohol choices (along with white wine since it's almost never used in tomato-based dishes).
He tried to use alcohols with more neutral taste close to vodka, red whine is to flavorful in comparison.
Fantastic video. Former restaurant person here. First off, there's a lot (potentially) going on chemically; for example, depending on cooking temps, some things might reach their Maillard Reaction temperatures (browning, caramelization) etc., which could influence final flavors, depending on the point at which alcohol was added. By adding it at a relatively low-temperature moment in the recipe, I wonder to what extent things might have been altered vs. adding it early. This felt like cooking Manderin but adding mirin at the very end, which (in my experience, at least) is a mistake, because one wants the sugars to convert to caramels and one wants to boil off most of the alcohol during cooking (although it's a tricky balance, because once it's in the wok, scraping the fond into the dish while on high temps until the moisture content drops enough is quite necessary to prevent harsh notes). I suspect the white-wine version would've been significantly upgraded if the wine was added with the butter and onions early, for example, but I'm not as convinced that the gin would've worked as well (very little sugar to work with, and who knows what bitters might result from floral / pine compounds reaching higher heat).
It also makes me think that perhaps one area that somebody oughtta try making a product for the trade is in extracts for certain aromatics that we wouldn't normally want to drink; for example, oregano or thyme. It looks like, from a cursory search of the Internet, that this is a thing already (found "Extracts by Annie" on Etsy, for example) and I immediately wondered, "hey, how much of thyme's notes will be preserved; is this even vaguely going to carry the notes of fresh thyme", since fresh thyme is one of those things that I, like most people, only buy at home when I know a dish won't be right with the dried version.
But this is an interesting theory: an Italian restaurant could use such extracts to cut down on prep-processing time and improve consistency while achieving A+ depths of flavor. One wonders if Olive Garden's test kitchen has tried this out (and if so, if they'd be willing to talk about it on the record). There are some other serious questions there, largely revolving around what would happen chemically as the flavenoids and other aromatic compounds were released (like, is it like mirin, where sooner is better... or is this something where it's better-used when temperatures won't permit much Maillard).
A worthy question. My guess is that your theories are already in practice at an industrial level (large-scale food manufacture) where extracts in bulk are likely more easily worked with than whole ingredients. Like, say, ice cream making, sauce sold by the can in many places, etc. Also, your theories on efficiency and consistency sound a lot like what many bartenders/mixologists do. If you want to make a drink with thyme flavoring I'll bet that an extract or infusion from fresh thyme would work great. Might not be the same as fresh (like, say, muddled thyme in a cocktail) but it would have its own merits and might actually make for better consistency, mouthfeel (no solid ingredients or pieces), more practicality with shelf life and storage, etc.
@@madtonesbr Yeah, I presume large companies doing industrial-level stuff (Campbell's, for example) have probably tested a lot of these things, and there are probably some expert-level books on this material out there where I can't follow the biochemistry, lol. Probably extracts of some of these things are harder to achieve than, "throw in booze, wait" and it's either impractical or expensive vs. simply throwing in measured amounts of raws. But it's interesting to think about how extracts could be applied in ways to achieve better palate notes or at least more consistency for diners' experiences, especially for those midrange chains where that's so important (Olive Garden, Applebees, Qdoba, etc.). One imagines professional tasters evaluating "sauce base no 39" where the key note is 120-day aged Moroccan thyme extract, lol.
2:19 here's how I satuee onions. 2tbs butter melted, chop/slice the onions and toss in. salt. let the water evaporate, and once they take on some nice color add in 1/2 cup of Marsala wine. reduce wine to a thick sauce that will coat the back of a spoon. serve.
I think this confirmed my initial thoughts about cooking, that it really does not matter how closely you follow a recipe. I used to measure exactly how much wine or vodka I put in dishes, but it looks like you can be off by like a factor of 2 in either direction and it's not going to make a difference. Pretty much salt and sugar are the only things which really matter that you're somewhat close, but ironically recipes rarely tell you how much of those to put and instead just say: add until you like it, which is probably way more accurate than any recipe can get.
This was a fascinating taste-test. Thank you Ethan!
On the subject of adding subtle flavors & aromas to cooked food with alcohol, it'd be really cool if you'd run this back with a few more spirits known for their distinct flavor/aroma profiles, namely:
Sherries - (Oloroso, amontillado, and a PX for intense fruity sweetness)
Whiskies - (Bourbon, a sherried scotch, and a peated scotch for the content)
All of these should have quite the distinct effect on the sauce flavor, and are my preferred spirits for adding dimension to food!
Yes! I was just about to ask why no casked/aged spirits such as Brandy or Whisk(e)y, and also why not Rum? Rum has a sugar base and has a lot of "funk" to it, so that would change the flavor profile a lot.
I can tell you that Brandy works very well.
I've always known to cook my chopped or whole tomatoes in the vodka first while making vodka sauce as it'll draw out the sweetness of the tomatoes. So I'd be curious as how the sauce would taste vs this method of first cooking a mother sauce then adding vodka to it. Instead of making the sauce with vodka from the start after sautéing the onions and garlic, adding the tomatoes then your vodka into it and letting it cook down.
even though this obviously isn't a 100% accurate and objective experiment, it's really cool that you did it. I always wondered what was the deal with adding wine or other types of alcohol to food.
One day I was cooking and we were out of vodka, so I decided to try our gin instead. I've never gone back! The herbaceous notes just adds such a nice, light complexity. Welcome to the pasta al gin train!
Ethan, you are like the Mythbusters of cooking! Love how rigorous you are with these videos!
Rising up to rival Alton Brown’s science informed cooking. At this point, I’ve learned about as much from Ethan as from Alton.
Thank you, Ethan, for working so hard to test and communicate the foundational variables of cooking!!
Alton got too far up his own ass. Also, he tried to claim that American GIs taught Koreans how to make fried chicken..a dish they've been making for about 500 years...
Videos with practical daily experiments are why I love youtube.
I've always been using gin instead of vodka in my sauce and im glad he arrived at the conclusion that I also have.
These videos are remarkably well made and edited, it’s clear you put many hours into each one. I am genuinely amazed! Thank you for producing such incredible content, it is appreciated!
This was so interesting! I love cooking with alcohol. I normally add wine or beer into many dishes I make. I even add tequila to some things. I've never used mezcal but I love smoky stuff so I could see this being amazing. The thought of using gin really peaked my curiosity and I could see those herbal notes being great in a pasta. Or even other dishes! Thank you so much. Now my mind is spinning how exactly I'm going to get 2% into my dishes cuz I don't measure very much stuff lol
A small detail with alcho not mentioned in your video but likely not relevant is alcho vs waters wetness. which could contribute to better spread over our tongue :) love the video keep up the amazing video's
As a Muslim who doesn’t drink or use alcohol in cooking I have always been so curious about this. Thank you !
Omg! There are extra layers of flavor to be had cooking with alcohol.
So far every dish ive done it to has been awesome!
I use old grand dads bonded bourbon. I use it in my tomato/basil sauce, and on my bean with bacon recipe. It definetly elevates both dishes, and i cook the alcohol out for 15 minutes or so. I would classify it non-alcoholic, but im not a professional.
I do drink occasionally, for me its a zen kind of thing. Ill have a drink at the end of the week to relax and treat myself to a flavor experience. I will tend to dabble in different products looking for new experiences. Even switching types of alcohol to beer, wine, rum, tequilla, etc. Its never at the front of my mind really though, just in fleeting bits. Ill tend to go a month or two every year completley forgetting alcohol exists.
Do you drink tea or coffee? Those are considered a narcotic, but i do drink a big cup of coffee everyday! Like the mandalorian says "this is the way"!
Just leave. Pork is delicious. So many Asian dishes use alcohol and pork. 😊
Whisk(e)y and desserts often pair well, depending on the choice of spirit. I once found myself with a bottle of Knob Creek bourbon that I didn't like to drink, but when I added it to the chocolate-graham cracker-almond base layer of a dessert bar recipe it was _amazing_ and brought black cherry and vanilla and a bit of caramel to the layer. It might be a challenge to find a good pairing for a peated Islay Scotch unless you love peat smoke, but unpeated whiskies in general should pair well with anything that isn't so powerfully flavoured that it'll overwhelm the influence of the spirit.
At 23:00 we can see that you kept on testing vodka during the video editing process, Ethan
It sounds like your mic is damaged. Still thank you for the great videos and amazing research!
This is amazing, Ethan! It'd be awesome to see what's the most optimal time to cook tomatoes for / and length of cooking. What happens to the tomatoes? What's the breakdown of the different flavors depending on the heat/ingredients/time of cooking? What makes a good tomato sauce?
Great video! Wondering how stored sauces would compair since the ethanol could extract more flavour over a week or so. When I add liqueurs like cognac to creme patissier (normally ~3% abv) and taste it right away it always is pretty mediocre, but leaving it overnight in the fridge allows everything to react/extract and then it tastes much better than if it were boozeless. I may have to make some sauces now lol
Man Ethan really appreciate all the time, work and effort that goes into your videos, especially the sciency ones like this!! I know I would never go through this to find this stuff out but definitely want to know lol - appreciate you going through it for us 😂 Amazing video
I ended up doing a crazy experiment set-up with making vanilla extract using different forms of alcohol...felt like your last experiment! Between vodka, bourbon, gin, and rum--rum was the extreme winner. Adding a sweetness that smells like velvet. I appreciate your science!
I've often called booze, "cooking soap," as in it combines the fat soluble and water soluble flavors.
Also, when I add alcohol, I tend to add it before I start adding water back to my sauce and I count watery vegetables and canned tomatoes and cream all as, "water." The main idea is that it works more to bind flavors if you add it soon after you've concentrated the your flavors from the onions desiccated/sauteed in butter.
I've typically used red wines, but there are so many different types (amount of tannins, sweetness, etc...) that it's really hard to predict. Then there are all the fruity alcohols (apple, lemon), herbal liqueurs (compari?) - there's even a tomato gin. So much to experiment now!
I switched from red wines to dessert/fortified wines like port or sherry, more specifically, I braise the onion and meat in it for bolognaise, So good!. :)
One more big questio, how does the ordet of adding ingredients during cooking influence the final taste? I would (potentially naively) add alcohol to the pan before I add tomato and cream. That would be an interesting taste test!
No you’re correct. Vodka should always go in after the onion and pancetta and before the sauces. Adding it after is the big no-no.
thats how its supposed to be done, and i was hoping that he'd test that
"wine is flavoured with grapes" is about the most American sentence I have ever heard in my life
I've always had the theory ppl will add alcohol to anything given the chance, even if the flavor profile doesn't change. Also, you can use a nonalcoholic substitute in a dish and the taste is often better!
I cook with non-alcoholic wine all the time because they have all the flavour compounds with no alcohol to burn off (and they're surprisingly low on calories as any sugar that would be in them has been converted to alcohol). Super tasty and no bitter notes.
So here's a thought: Would someone who drinks a lot of hard liquor have a significantly different experience? A heavy drinker might not detect bitterness in the same way. I know when I was at my worst, whisky just tasted sweet and hot without significant bitterness.
Great test tasing it raw and also cooked aswel! Good to see the alcohol less foods were the better ones, the reason why to not add alcohol into certain dishes besides red wine is explained by this video. In my opinion a great video and really valuable content, love your videos keep these up! 🔥
Yo Ethan, thanks for being a hero to the home chef. Like, truly, man. All of your videos are ACTUALLY like 5 of my own dumbass botched meals, and I still don't know what I did wrong. You are the man.
As someone who doesn't drink, I've wondered what I may be missing out on by skipping alcohol in dishes. I especially like braising, and have tried different red wine substitues several times. It is interesting to see these results. I imagine there are some alcohol analogues out there for people like me if we want to try and add flavor to our dish without adding alcohol.
There probably are other solvents that can extract tastes and then release them as a taste cloud into your mouth and nose, but then I would rather stick to the ethanol.
If you've ever eaten, say, some strawberries that were slightly overripe, you can detect an enhanced fruitiness from increased esters and very small amounts of alcohols. If you use alcoholic drinks in cooking in the proportions recommended in this video, you're not really consuming any more than that.
As always I love your dedication to the method. One thing I notice is that you should use 100g of sauce every time because you are reducing the amount of the other ingredients. That would make adding each percent of alcohol a gram, no half grams and you will have a closer final weight of each of the final products.
My favourite alcohols for cooking are whiskey/brandy (same "spectrum" - aged wood, lots of caramel flavours) and cider, which works similar to white wine. I'm glad to have found out how alcohol actually works when it comes to cooking.
You are supposed to use the vodka before the actual watery stuff (tomatoes for example). You put oil, onion and garlic with pancetta, let is cook for short time, add vodka, let it evaporate and then use the tomatoes. The food is not meant to be boozey at all.
Exactly.
Im going to add, that one factor that might make Vodka improve a sauce, might be in a slow cook recipe.. where the alcohol has time to create new flavor compounds. In fact, it might be interesting.. if you tested a vodka sauce that was sitting uncooked in the fridge, for like 2 days.. to see if the taste changes.
When I was doing Chinese martial arts, we used a herbal solution to rub into our fists.. before hitting a wall mounted sand-bag. This was an all natural Herbal Solution, with an Alcohol base, called "Dit Da Jow" (Ditt dahh jow). They use all natural ingredients, and toss them into a Jar... and let it sit for at least 1 year. The stuff is INCREDIBLE. A drop or two.. rubbed into any swollen tissue... and the swelling will be GONE in less than 5 minutes flat! With deep tissue bruises, it will reduce the healing time, by like 70%, when applied each day.
Some Chinese companies have tried to make Synthetic Jow... and I can tell you from testing it myself.. that it does not work for BEANS compared to the all-natural stuff. And in fact... A Western Scientists did a comparison of Traditional natural Jow, compared with the modern synthetics... and found that the traditional Jow had like 100 more different Compounds that had managed to form within it. It was a completely different animal.
My point being.. that in "certain" instances... the longer an Alcohol has to Interact with the Ingredients the greater the possible changes to the flavor profiles, and other compounds that will be created, as a result. For example... it would be good to test a Vodka based sauce that was left uncooked in the fridge for a few days... rather than being instantly made/cooked. Then compare three differences: 1) A freshly made Vodka sauce. 2) A Vodka sauce that was left in the fridge uncooked, for at least 2 to 3 days. 3) A sauce Without the vodka in it... freshly made. 4) A sauce without Vodka, that was left in the fridge uncooked for 2 to 3 days.
In other cases, flame cooking an alcohol, can also change the flavor profile. For example, when cooking Chicken Marsala.. Id see the chefs end up lighting the thing on fire, in the pan, right after it was poured in.
The Yard House restaurant had a vodka shrimp pasta on their menu.
It was phenomenal. So basic, yet extremely delicious.
I worked at an ice cream shop that had a plethora of liquor flavors I don't even think it was entirely cooked off before it was churned but the bourbon was my favorite. Lick honest ice creams in Austin Texas if you want to look up their flavors
Thanks, I now want Jim Beam ice cream. 😂
Actually, if you follow the recipe for Penne alla Vodka, the alcohol is added after the onion is well cooked and before any other ingredients and vodka is allowed to evaporate. This results in the taste of vodka and not the alcohol part.
Your channel just takes food science to a whole different level ❤
Vodka doesn't equal vodka.
The traditional vodka is made out of rye, so wheat and corn based vokas already introduce slightly different aromas. Potato based vodka, which is quite common too, also has a slightly different aroma. You might want to look into doing another "Which vodka pasta tastes best?" type of video based on the different types of vodka. ;)
I was thinking this through the whole video
An important thing to note is that Vodka is nowhere near 'flavourless' (meaning no other flavours than ethanol) as people claim. I haven't tried commercial everclear/grain alcohol, but I have distilled alcohol to 95% with a very tall reflux column. It is very truly _near_ flavourless (with a slight hint of a strange sweetness than is unique to ethanol in my experience). None of the bitterness you get from Vodka.
I know that may contradict what you've read, but please try it beside grain alcohol and you will see.
The best vodkas are supposed to have as little additional flavors as possible, it should taste like water that burns and makes you drunk. That is why it is served cold, higher temperatures makes flavors more noticeable. As you said it is not flavorless but it separates good vodka from a bad one. At least that's my Polish experience of it. Best vodkas I drank were extremely smooth, almost flavorless with a little hint of grain notes and barely any bitterness.
The whole tasting element of vodka is really interesting because one of the legal defining factors of vodka, at least in the US, is that it has to be distilled to 95% and then diluted to whatever proof you want with water afterwards. Despite that fact plenty of vodkas do have obviously different flavors. I haven't actually ever heard where those flavor differences are supposed to come from exactly. You can tell that vodka retains far less of the flavor compounds of the original mash however if you were to compare a corn vodka to a unaged bourbon also distilled from corn but to a much lower end ABV. I'm have very few opinions on vodka, I don't hate it but don't love it either. Unaged bourbon very much is not my thing at all, it has a bizarre sweet "corny" flavor that I absolutely do not like.
Vodka is distilled to 95% and then has water added. They probably aren’t using distilled water so the water used for dilution has some flavor for sure
@@huckthatdish I'd also assume ethanol binds some flavor molecules that are hard to separate and I don't think it's even a good idea to do so. Pure ethanol doesn't taste great and drinking something that tastes like diluted nail polish remover is not preferable. In Poland and other EU countries we make vodkas mainly from grains (wheat, rye, barley) and potatoes from 96% alcohol and it must contain no less than 37.5%. Each have distinct taste although very subtle. Because of this lower limit classic żubrówka with its slightly yellow tint and distinct taste is still considered a vodka. But even though they differ a bit I still wouldn't consider them good option for cooking. Wine, brandy, sherry, rum and even whisky have a lot more distinct flavors to bring to a dish than a vodka that is supposed to be as neutral as possible. Even if pure ethanol slightly elevates the flavor it doesn't seem to be worth a hassle when you can add wine and introduce sweetness and fruitiness and make while still getting that 1% uplift from its alcohol content.
@@afgncap oh yeah wasn’t arguing it’s good for cooking. (Outside of batters for frying. You don’t want any flavor from it at all in that case, you just want lower boiling point for crispier crust so you really do just want ethanol and as few flavor compounds as possible.)
Excellent video! Really high quality scientific experiment about cooking. Please keep more coming like this!
What I have learned is that in making the pasta from scratch, adding a part of vodka to the egg and flour mixture helps with mixing without activating so much gluten as adding water would
4:57 F L O R M
I did a previous binge of Ethan's videos before, but subscribing now because of the use of metric.
GIN could virtually be considered a type of “vodka”, given the flavoured vodkas they do have places like Russia and Poland. Very strong, delicious and not shy of adding some botanical ingredients.
And the traditional foil of Russian vodka is not a juice chaser, but a snack like a salted pickle.
I'm a mock tail kinda girl.
Watching you blindly stuff food into your mouth is very satisfying. Great job on these videos. I really enjoy learning about these cooking nuances.