As a distiller I am constantly regaled with people’s anecdotes of being “allergic” to products like gin “because this one time…” I usually try not to say anything, but eventually someone directly asks me why they would be allergic to certain products and not others. The answer they’re always weirdly disappointed to hear is they’re almost certainly not allergic to anything, they just drank too much. Sure, it’s theoretically possible to be allergic to certain botanical extractives, but if that were true you’d have a much more notable allergic reaction to foods containing sage, licorice, juniper and damn near any spiced food. The fact is that (most) clear spirits are the least likely to give you a hangover from the cumulative effect of ethanol plus methanol, n-propanol and other fermentation congeners; but it’s really the ethanol that does 99% of the job. The closer a product is to the original fermentation (especially a warmer ferment like ales), the more crap that’s in it, which anecdotally makes me feel shittier, but it’s overdoing it in the first place that fucks you up.
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