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Alcohol
The Good, the Bad, the Calories
By Felicia Hodges
And that's just before dinner arrives. Don't forget about the wine that is served with the meal or the sherry that may be a part of the recipe.
"It is believed that the temperatures used during cooking actually dissipate the alcohol in recipes, though," says chef Darlene Cotterrill of Newburgh, N.Y., who owns a catering business and a restaurant supply company. "So you still get the tease of the taste without a lot of actual alcohol."
But according to a 1996 USDA study, the theory about alcohol evaporating when cooked is not such a sound one. Anywhere from 5 to 85 percent of the original amount of alcohol may remain in cooked dishes, depending on how the food is heated (slowly simmered or "flash cooked" like a stir-fry), how long it cooks (the longer it cooks, the less alcohol remains) and the alcohol source (white wine at about 12 to 14 percent alcohol leaves less behind than port wine or sherry, which has about 17 to 21 percent alcohol). So if you aren't used to drinking, are working to cut down on your alcohol consumption or are cooking for anyone who should be, be mindful of what you're adding to your recipe and of how you prepare it.
The main ingredient in any alcoholic beverage is ethanol, a water-soluble chemical that gives it the remarkable ability to invade every body cell through absorption rather than digestion. Most of it is absorbed directly into the blood stream through the stomach and small intestines, which enables it to work quickly through the body. How much is absorbed – measured via the blood alcohol content, which gives the percentage of alcohol in the blood stream – is what that state trooper is trying to determine during a breathalyzer test.
