What is gin and tonic?
By Chelsie Vandaveer
May 23, 2003
Series: | 1 | | 2 | | 3 | | 4 | | 5 | | 6 |
killerPlants Tendrils: ~~1~~2~~3~~4~~5~~
Suggested Reading: Click here.
Tonics were considered any remedy which improved the tone or vigor of the stomach and intestines, or the muscles in general and hence preserved or improved overall health. Non-medicinal tonics included such activities as exercise in the open air, vigorous massages, steam rooms, and cold baths. Medicinal tonics called vegetable extracts, were taken internally and were of two types. The first acted on the stomach and 'improved' digestion like willow, dandelion, chamomile, and gentian. The second supplied some needed vitamin or mineral. (Century Unabridged Dictionary, 1889)
Jesuit's bark (powdered Cinchona bark) had been used to treat malaria and other fevers in Europe since the early 1600s. Quinine was not a cure; it reduced the fever and interfered with the blood parasites. The causative agent of malaria would not be known until discovered in 1880 by Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran, a French doctor.
In 1820, two French chemists, Pierre-Joseph Pelletier and Joseph Caventou, isolated the alkaloid, quinine, from the bark. Proper standardized dosages of the drug could be given; where risk of malaria was high, the extremely bitter quinine became a preventative measure, a tonic.
Quinine and its isomer, quinidine, do not dissolve readily in water. According to the Merck Index (11th edition, 1989), it takes about two liters of water to dissolve one gram of the powder, but a gram will dissolve in about 0.8 milliliter of alcohol. Human dosages of quinine are much less than a gram, generally around 200 milligrams, and could be easily dissolved in a couple of ounces of ethanol (ethyl alcohol). It is said that the British in India dissolved their dosages in gin and used lemon or lime to help disguise the flavor. Gin, the bitter quinine, and the citrus became an acquired taste.
In the mid-1800s, the Schweppes Company introduced tonic water. Tonic water became the mixer for gin. Six ounces (177 ml.) tonic water though, has very little quinine and does nothing to prevent malaria, but the drink became firmly established in British and American cultures.
Quinine fluoresces under ultraviolet light, the reason a drink containing tonic water glows blue in bars that have 'black lights'. The School of Chemistry, Bristol University has a page with a photograph of a bottle of tonic water. When moused-over, the photograph changes to the bottle under UV light. To see how tonic water fluoresces, click on the link:
http://www.chm.bris.ac.uk/webprojects2002/jeffrey/interesting.htm
Series: | 1 | | 2 | | 3 | | 4 | | 5 | | 6 |
killerPlants Tendrils: ~~1~~2~~3~~4~~5~~
Suggested Reading:
What was Jesuit Powder? Plants that Changed History - April 30, 2002
Who was José Celestino Mutis? Plants that Changed History - May 20, 2003
Who smuggled quinine seeds for the British? Plants that Changed History - May 27, 2003
How did the Dutch monopolize quinine? Plants that Changed History - June 3, 2003
|
BACK TO TOP
