Whisky & Women

I have heard it said that women are generally better ‘noses’ than men. Is this true?

Yes, this is a widespread belief, similar to that which says women catch more salmon than men. The latter is attributed to pheromones, abundant in nature, although Wikipedia warns: “Their existence and impact in humans remain highly controversial and unproven, lacking clear, strong evidence”.

While I was researching this subject, I discovered that pheromones are registered by the olfactory epithelium, which also registers smell – so essential for assessing whisky. The olfactory epithelium is part of the limbic system of our brains, which is described as ‘paleo-mammalian’ – it formed before we became mammals! So maybe there is a link between women/smell/taste/pheromones.

I sought the advice of Téa Nicolae, who is currently writing a doctoral thesis the female palate. With many thanks and her gracious permission I am attaching her authoritative article below. She makes no mention of pheromones…

The Female Palate

The Unique Female Palate: Women and Whisky

Téa Nicolae

I noticed it in myself. Returning to the same dram at different points in my cycle, I felt it shift: one week sweetness bloomed; the next, bitterness sharpened unexpectedly. Flavours that had once gone unnoticed became vivid, while old favourites sometimes felt muted. It was as if the whisky was speaking a slightly different language to me each time I picked up the glass.

What felt mysterious turned out to have a biological explanation.

The Science of Perception

Women, on average, detect and distinguish aromas with greater acuity than men (Doty and Cameron, 2009). Estrogen modulates sensory receptors and shapes how the brain processes taste and smell, which means subtle nuances - smoke, medicinal phenols, delicate esters - tend to register more vividly on a female palate. Sensitivity to sweetness, bitterness, and spice shifts across hormonal cycles (Stanić et al., 2021), and women are also more likely to be supertasters, meaning, they carry a higher density of taste receptors on the tongue (Bartoshuk et al., 1994). Menopause introduces its own recalibration: sweetness may fade while saltiness or metallic notes move forward (Pedada et al., 2024). While certain patterns contour as such, research indicates that a woman’s unique biological constitution further dictates her specific taste peaks and troughs: two women at the same cycle phase can therefore experience differences informed by their individual physiology (TheWhiskyBaba, 2026).

The female palate therefore shifts, deepens, and changes what a spirit has to offer. I believe that this is part of what makes whisky so rewarding for women. A spirit with as many layers as whisky becomes a medium for ongoing discovery when it interacts with such a rich palate, through which what you taste now is not necessarily what you will taste in a fortnight.

The Female Sensorium

For too long, whisky's story has been told in a single voice. Its language, its rituals, its tasting notes have been shaped around a palate that is far from the only one at the table. As women step more visibly into this world, we begin to see that the female palate isn't simply another consumer segment - it is a different way of knowing a spirit, continuously unfolding, and deserving of a vocabulary that rises from its own experience – and a seat at the table.

References

Bartoshuk, L. M., et al. (1994). PTC/PROP tasting: anatomy, psychophysics, and sex effects

Doty, R. L., & Cameron, E. L. (2009). Sex differences and reproductive hormone influences on human odor perception.

Pedada, K., et al. (2024). Taste Changes and Salivary Flow Rate Disparities in Premenopausal and Postmenopausal Women: Exploring the Zinc Connection

Stanić, A., et al. (2021). Sensory perception and the hormonal cycle.