i didn't think it could but my boyfriend went into our cabinet the other day and was going to drink some bushmills. however, it was really cloudy looking and it looked like there was particles of something in it. it was so strange. the bottle was open and i'd guess a little more than half gone. my boyfriend decided to try it anyways and got sick. i dumped the rest of it out.

Wow.  I've never heard of such a thing.  It is possible for a contamination to get into an open container and spoil the contents--but 40% alcohol (80 proof) is usually way too high for microbes to survive in.  Things happen, I guess.  It's too bad it happened to a quality whiskey like Bushmill's, though!



Typically, whiskey does NOT go bad.  It doesn't age in the bottle, but will sit there, more or less unchanged, for an indefinite length of time.  I have bottles of stuff over ten years old in my liquor cabinet that are still drinkable, but they're not the types of liquor I usually drink.

Bushmill's should not be cloudy and orange. If that bottle sat open and looked way funky, then your bf is an idiot.  I wouldn't think that any mold or other things that make you sick would develop, but c'mon.  Who drinks stuff that just looks like it's gone bad?

Any alcohol, once it's been opened, can go bad. It's not that there's bacteria or mold, it's the exposure to oxygen that does it. It happens to wine too. I've got a bottle of opened wine in my fridge that's already gone flat.

Whiskey does not usually go bad but it sounds as if yours did.



If extra liquid got in it and dropped the alcohol ratio or the lid was not tight and the alcohol evaporated then it could easily go bad.

well normally u get sick when u drink lol..but nah it shouldnt  i had peach moonshine in my cupboard for 3 some years maybe even more the peaches turned to mush but man those mushies would kick your ***...then i drank it and i was fine..sept drunk

No, never ever.  No pathogens can live at ABVs above 8%.

well i dont know about cloudy but when you leave the top off a handle for a while it tastes terrible...