Has anybody else lost their taste for alcohol?

Good point Absent. It's an unsophisticated palette. I think if my first taste of alcohol had been the 49p bottle of 'Riesling' from Augustus Barnett which I was once offered (and drank - with difficulty) I would have said I didn't like it either.

When I was young, the 'working classes' didn't drink wine and I can remember when my husband and I first bought some in the 1960's - of course we began on the dreadful Blue Nun but progressed through the years to drier wines, which we would order very bravely in restaurants.

I lost my taste for most sweet things many years ago - it drove my daughter mad when I was living with her, as I would buy a block of nut chocolate and eat one piece a day - she is a chocoholic. I think she thought I was doing it to spite her in some way, but any more just feels sickly to me. Now, I buy very dark chocolate, over 80% cocoa content, but it is very bitter so I choose the type with some burnt almonds, or orange chips. Again, I eat one square per day. The only chocolates that I cannot resist are the expensive brands of chocolate brazils - I go mad and have a box every Christmas! I usually choose ice-cream for dessert in restaurants, and at home I have rum and raisin, or coffee with a bit of cream, which I still love.

My mother never lost her taste for sweet things and neither has my sister, so it obviously does not happen to everyone.
Do men have less of a sweet tooth than women? I have never heard a man admit to being a chocoholic!

I may have an unsophisticated palette but I sure as heck can smell the difference between whisky and beer that's for sure, maybe I'm alone in thinking most types of alcohol have their own distinctive taste/smell. But then why do people inhale the smell when sampling wines/whiskey?

I think absent was referring to pure alcohol - if you drank that you would not live to comment, I think!

I think you are being disingenuous, absent, when people talk about alcohol, they don't usually mean the pure poison, they mean alcoholic drinks.

Without the smell, most alcoholic drinks would seem identical, and not worth distinguishing between. The taste is in the smell. The aficionados can tell one grape from another, or one distillery from another, even one vintage from another, by their smell. The rest of us have to gulp a mouthful or two before we know whether we like it or not.

I never really took to alcohol. I didn't like the taste, the effect it has when you drank it and even less the effects if you have a bit too much.

So I never really drank very much and while I have had the occasional morning when I have regretted the night before it has usually been after a group round the dining table evening when conversation has been so animated I have failed to notice my hostess, and one hostess in particular, constantly refilling glasses.

Now with the wide range of alternative non-alcoholic drinks available I rarely drink, occasionally I have a glass of red wine with a meal, the odd sloe gin (home made) on a cold evening in front of the fire and a pint of shandy in the summer, but rarely more than that.

More importantly nowadays nobody comments if you go the non-alcoholic route. In my university and early working days when the only alternative was squash or mixers, unmixed, I got really fed up with having to defend myself for not consuming alcohol. Even in a predominantly male work environment I never felt a need to be 'one of the boys' and I do not think not my abstemiousness did me any harm.

Greatnan - I used to love Blue Nun, I thought I was so sophisticated drinking that.. We also drank Mateus Rose in the '70s, we used to make lamps out of the bottles! I also drank Cherry B which I couldn't face now at any price.

KatyK you can still get Cherry B. I had some last year at a cocktail party (exactly! what sort of cocktail party was that?) Anyway, it was quite nice - tasted like a fortified wine and there were sweet canapés that made it taste better.

My macho young male relatives make me laugh - they're all into fruit ciders, and declare themselves aficionados about the different brands and tastes. Kopperburg pear cider is just like Babycham! Just that you drink it out of the bottle, instead of a cocktail glass.

KatyK - I have to confess to drinking Babycham - in those silly saucer-shaped glasses that let the bubbles escape!
I don't think anybody likes the taste of alcoholic drinks at first - you have to persevere.
The first time I went into a pub I was 17 and had a date with a lad doing his National Service. He asked what I wanted to drink, and the only drink I could think of was what my auntie's drank at Christmas - port and lemon. 'Not on a squaddie's pay', he said, and ordered me half of beer. I hated it.

I think Cherry B was the first (and not the last) drink that made me ill. I loved Babycham. Someone bought me a set of those glasses with the little yellow deer on them - I still have one left. To this day my sister and myself always have a Babycham on Christmas morning. I used to love port and lemon too !

Does anyone remember the saucer shaped glasses that had a minute hole near the base that made a line of the bubbles rise up to the surface? Were these the proper Babycham glasses?

When we moved to Suffolk in the early seventies we were eager to make friends with the young farmers who gathered every Sunday lunchtime at the local pub. One of them was buying a round so I asked for a G&T..... Dead silence and hostile stares . Somebody quietly pointed out to me that the men drank pints of beer and the women drank halves. I nursed my first half of bitter for the whole session, sipping it very slowly and wishing I'd asked for an orange juice.

When we went home I noticed DH had a couple of bottles of light ale sticking out of his pocket.

"Better get you used to this stuff if you want to fit in."

I wasn't being snobby but where I came from women just didn't drink beer. I often drink a half of bitter now because I'm always the driver and I can make it last forever.

Our neighbour makes his own cider from apple trees that have been in the village for hundreds of years. There is a plan to build on the field where they grow and the older villagers are up in arms. Having tasted the cider over the weekend, I'm with the builders.

Oh, I remember them. Never liked Babysham though - too sweet. I'm afraid I haven't lost my taste for alcohol although I can't drink 'neat' wine anymore unless it's under 12% - so I have spritzers instead. I don't like getting tiddly though as I'm a control freak so don't have more than one - sometimes two - most nights.

Now off to buy Vodka for Aka's Blackcurrant Crème de Cassis

Sorry, my remember was for the Babysham glasses.

I LOVE champagne - probably my favourite drink! Never get a hangover with it.

I love the old-style saucer champagne glasses - they look so decadent!

But they are terrible for drinking any sparkling wine from!

Years ago I had a rich friend who would pour me glasses of vintage ('69 I think) champagne... the difference between that and the non-vintage Brut you normally get was extraordinary! I'd prefer a claret any day.

My employer was strange - he would buy expensive champagne, then use his gold swizzle stick to get rid of the bubbles! I like mine in a flute.

Now champagne - nice champagne - is something I can drink more of. Delicious, get lightly jolly and no hangover.

Champagne is special. I like the way the bubbles tickle my nose [and make me giggle].

Don't forget that the Tesco champagne won over far more expensive brands in a blind tasting with 'experts'. So go and treat yourselves!

Champagne is wonderful but I can happily make do with a good Prosecco!

Nice with caviar! if you can afford it!

Hardys Crest Sparkling Chardonnay Pinot Noir makes a very good substitute for champagne. I buy it when it's on offer for about £7, and keep a couple in te fridge.