Many are aware that laws enabled by a US constitutional amendment, later
repealed, effectively prohibited many alcoholic beverage sales in the US (in
practice, increased their prices and gross margins and reduced quality
control) between nominally 1919 and 1933 (depending slightly on how you
count). This interval may be compared with prohibition in Bulgaria (an
ancient wine-producing region, unlike the US) from 1396 to 1878, a 482-year
interval.

"Alcohol" is of course an Arabic word [like algebra and many others] derived
from al-kuhl, referring to an extractable essence, or as traditionally
expressed in English, spirits. (Jancis Robinson, ed., _Oxford Companion to
Wine._)

When Arabs introduced the then recent science of distilling into Europe in
the Middle Ages, alchemists believed that alcohol was the long-sought elixir
of life. This related to its rendering in various medieval European
languages as water-of-life: eau-de-vie, usquebaugh -- the latter Gaelic
coming to English as "whisky." (Goodman and Gilman, eds., _Pharmacological
Basis of Therapeutics,_ 4th ed., 1970.)

Alcohol is metabolized at a roughly fixed rate of about 10ml per hour in an
adult. [i.e., 5-6 hours for four ounces of whisky or 1.25 quarts of beer.]
This is the process that clears it from the blood, and in principle, if
taken slowly and steadily enough, all of it will be metabolized, with
nutritive value, and the blood concentration will remain insignificant.
(Paraphrased from G&G.) I will add that this is not a common practice.