This Ingenious New Invention Could Remove the Gross Stuff from Your Whiskey

Media Platforms Design Team

(Photo Credit: Time & Oak)

Did you even know there was gross stuff hiding in there?

Portland, Oregon-based startup company Time & Oak has taken to Kickstarter to garner support for a new product, designed to get rid of the junk in your favorite spirit and ramp up the aging process on a very small scale.

But why the need for a product like this, you ask? What is it exactly that makes all the whiskeys on the market so different from one another?

The short answer — the aging process.

Aging adds flavor, color, and depth, but it also filters out the junk you don't want lurking in your favorite beverage — chemicals like methoxy-phenyl-oxime (commonly found in pig and mouse feces) and acetaldehyde (the higher the level in your blood, the worse your hangover is likely to be). According to a study by the National Center for Biotechnology Information, whiskey that spends more time in oak barrels is also metabolized slower in the body. So, in addition to to feeling better the next morning, you may feel better (i.e. less drunk) while sipping your spirits.

Another plus to aging?

As whiskey ages, large-molecule alcohols like methanol and butanol are trapped and extracted, removing the harshness (read: unpleasant to drink-ness) from the finished product. So it's no surprise that those award-winning, high-end whiskeys can be aged for more than 20 years, while the less expensive, younger brands can be sold after only four years of oak-barrel aging — and it's often easy to taste the difference.

What Time & Oak can do with that.

Essentially, this brilliant new product claims that it will allow you filter a young whiskey, and get it to taste like, smell like, look like (and have a chemical makeup more similar to) a premium aged whiskey, after you've already purchased the bottle. Insert the Whiskey Elements sticks into a bottle of booze (1 stick for a fifth, 2 sticks for a half-gallon) and let sit for a mere 24 hours. The result, the company claims, is lower levels of both methoxy-phenyl-oxime and acetaldehyde (those unappetizing chemicals explained above), allowing you to enjoy a better spirit, even if you haven't shelled out for the fancy stuff. An added bonus: Whiskey Elements come in a variety of all-natural flavors (yes, flavors) like vanilla, so for those who aren't whiskey purists, making customized flavors could be a cool part of the process.

So this thing really works?

Whiskey Elements aren't yet available for purchase, so we've yet to test this incredible invention for ourselves (though we're working on making that happen) — but even if it does work wonders on a more affordable spirit, we can't help but think it's just worth it to pony up for a really good bottle from a knowledgeable and talented distiller.

For more information on how the inventors came up with the product and the process behind it, watch this video: