I was out int he cold last night with a group of people and somebody mentioned vodka or something like that. Somebody else said that alchol is a bad idea for cold weather because it doesn’t actually freeze, but rather just gets colder and colder.
Sounds iffy to me, but I’m curious. Is it true? If so, why?
I don’t know if alcohol doesn’t freeze at all, but it certainly doesn’t freeze at your average freezer temperature. Best way to drink vodka is after it’s been sitting in the freezer for sometime, it goes a little thick and syrupy.
I’ve had two bottles of vodka in my freezer for quite a long time… I can honestly say they’ve never frozen, but I haven’t noticed that they get thick and syrupy either. The brands are Grey Goose and Absolut Citron. 
It’s a subtle difference and maybe it only seems thicker, I’d be interested in hearing any real facts about it.
I don’t have the exact figures, but I can tell you that Jagermeister at 35% alcohol, will not freeze in my freezer, while a certain other liqeur, at 25% will. (70 and 50 proof, respectively).
But to address the jist of OP, the danger in cold weather doesn’t come from the fact that whiskey or whatnot isn’t frozen when you drink it, it’s that it gives your body the perception it’s warmer, while actually lowering your body temperature.
And it’s very to freeze to death if you’re passed out drunk.
…errr… “gist”, even.
From HERE
It’ll freeze. But not in a normal kitchen freezer.
… of course, that should be NEGATIVE 40.78
What I’ve heard is that alcohol, because it freezes at a very low temperature, will still be liquid when it is too cold to safely drink, and you can cause yourself damage to your esophagus by drinking it. Second, even though it “burns” you, it is actually making you colder, so it fools you into thinking it is warming you up when actually it is cooling you down. Third, it dilates your blood vessels, making your body lose more heat.
I can vouch for this - when I lived in a house with a decent freezer (ie it had a temperature gauge), -25c was perfect for just bringing vodka to freezing, so you’d get a slush of ice crystals
Pure ethanol freezes at approx. -114 degrees C, which is very cold. I suspect that drinking any liquid cooled to that temperature would be dangerous.
Yep, there is a danger in very cold liquids, because you instinctively think “Well, if it’s still liquid, it can’t be that cold.”
When I worked in a lab, we used a mixture of dry ice and acetone to freeze samples. That was about -77ºC (-106ºF), well into the brass-monkey zone. One day, while brain was not engaged, I hooked a sample out with bare hands. Only the very tip of one finger contacted the liquid, but I sure knew about it.
But come on… nobody’s storing their whiskey at -106… Be it in your freezer or on your porch on in your hip flask, it ain’t gonna flash-freeze your esophagus.
It makes you feel warm. <— That’s the problem.
Yes, that’s probably the main reason. But in Siberia, say, where temperatures of -50ºC are not unheard of (that’s a link to current temperatures, I believe) you could certainly get frostbite if you drank vodka that was still liquid.
I’ve been backpacking in the winter at temps of -20 to -30 F and some folks still bring alcohol along. At those temps, you can cause frostbite problems to the throat as well as hypothermia problems by introducing very cold liquids into your body core.
This is without taking in the problems of alcohol being a vasal dialator, which is a serious enough problem.
This has been my experience as well. I have heard for a long time that Vodka gets thicker in the freezer, but I have not noticed it to any degree.
BTW, Welcome back Jin!
I know what Death Ray means. It’s not the consistency of motor oil, but there is a slight sluggishness to the vodka (or whiskey, in my case) as you pour it out of the cold, frost-covered bottle.
I always thought the sluggishness of the liquor was from the partial freezing of the water in which the alcohol was dissolved.
Next time I’m really really bored at work, I’ll make up some ethanol/water solutions of varying strenghts, stick them in our -70 C freezer, and see which ones will freeze.
Well. To be honest, I probably won’t. But I could. And that’s what’s important, after all.
By the way, why do people do this? Just to reduce the amount of water (melted ice) in mixed drinks?