Strikes me that alcohol is a flavor / texture / scent component (often hidden) in wine more than other drinks.
Personally I wish that instead of occasional zero alcohol experiments from marketers, high level winemakers would set a serious goal of returning to making great wines at 10-12% alcohol
Many other drinks. Alcohol is pretty dominant in a martini.
thereās Champagne for that already, thanks.
If itās not booze, I like tea. But I like my tea after my booze.
I know that it is .02, but that is effectively zero tolerance. You canāt comfortably have a 5% beer or a glass of wine and drive home afterwards. When I drive to dinner, Iāll take a couple sips of my wifeās beer or wine. Couple this with the fact that every traffic stop begins a breathalyzer, and Iāll call it zero tolerance. (This is coming from an Americanās point of view)
The laws are also part of the reason that good restaurants arenāt able to survive outside of big cities. Sure Sweden has a handful of great destination countryside restaurants, but countryside towns are a culinary wasteland.
The big problem really is that the breathalyzers the Swedish police use (or, used to use, been a while) is a yay/nay type detector (shows if you have any alcohol on sample, not the actual quantity), and off you go to the proper test at the police station. This might have changed in the past 15 years, itās been a while since Iāve driven in Sweden.
But itās not zero tolerance, as you can have a beer or two and still be legal, but you might have a little detour to the police station to prove it. I popped āpositiveā because I just crawled out of bed, had brushed my teeth and used mouthwash, and drove off the FinlandsfƤrjan in VƤrtahamnen. The confirmation sample correctly showed 0.00.
Makes sense what you say about restaurants not being able to survive. Is FƤviken still alive btw?
FƤviken has been closed for a few years. Magnus moved down to Southern Sweden and bought and apple and pear orchard. Rumor is that he is opening a new concept soon, but I donāt know any of the details.
Does this foretell the emergence of a synthetic alternative to alcohol that doesnāt have the side-effects? Weāve done this for sugar and fat and it seems that the alternatives come with different side effects than what they replace, but there isnāt ever a full equivalence of the original experience without some compromise somewhere in the complex chemistry of the body.
For those of you touting alcohol-free beers, can you suggest some that you particularly enjoy? Iāve sampled some but havenāt really found any that I would purchase regularly. Since Iām not trying to remove the alcohol from my diet, Iām coming into the tasting with an evaluation basis that gives no points for being alcohol-freeā¦i.e. it has to just be a great beer, regardless of the alcohol content.
Cheers,
fred
I mostly drink alcohol free beers from danish breweries. From those maybe Mikkeller might be available to you.
We do see Mikkeller here (and I love their beers). Iāll keep an eye out for the N/A offeringsā¦I donāt recall seeing them on the shelf.
Thanks,
fred
Athletic brewing company has a great selection of non-alcoholic beers. Mostly IPAs, they do a stout and a few others as well. They can be found across the US, though the best selection is direct from their website, where they have their special brews.
Iām particularly enjoying the Force Majeure belgian beer, but I donāt know if that is available in the US yet. Their Triple Hop is amazing.
Iāve found 90%+ of mocktails to be unbearably sweet and sugary.
I am familiar with some of the Athletic offerings and havenāt been wowed by them. They are widely available in my market so will seek out some of the styles beyond the mainstream to check out.
fred
I was served Implosion IPA and Anarkistās Hazy IPA blind in a lineup with 3 other IPAās that had alcohol - I could not tell that any of them were non-alcoholic.
Also for wine: Mikkeller has made a beer called āLimbo Rieslingā - it is hands down the best non-alcoholic wine I have tasted. Lovely acidity and mouthfeel.
Also some very good non-alcoholic IPAs!
I think if one wanted non-alcoholic āwineā that somewhat resembles wine, off dry whites are the one area that can come closest.
Navarroās Gewurtztraminer grape juice wine was pretty good when my wife was pregnant.
Itās hard to imagine, knowing what wine is and how itās made, you could ever make something that truly resembles a good quality red wine that has no alcohol. But Iād love to be wrong about that.
Agreed. Itās like caffeine, which turned out to be quite essential to the original Coke flavor.
I think thatās true, but even more than that, the conversion of sugar into alcohol is the crux of what makes grapes into wine. Thatās where color, tannin, complex flavors, etc. come from.
There are techniques for dealcoholizing wine, but those vacuum, boiling, spinning cone processes undoubtedly change the product a great deal, and I think they are expensive. Iām not sure if there is any promise to those technologies; Iād be interested to hear if anyone knows more about it.
Or, maybe those processes can be used to reduce the alcohol in a wine (e.g. 6% alcohol pinot noir) as sort of a compromise between alcohol reduction and unfavorable changes to the wine. But Iām not sure how much of a market there would be for that.
Are people on this thread really willing to spend the same price on NA wine that they would on regular wine? I guess I can see spending $5-10 on a NA beer for āhydrationā since a good bottle of sparkling water is getting in that range. Maybe I am a cheapskate, a drunk, or both, but I canāt see spending more than maybe $20 on a 750ml of tasty juice. But I also get peeved over spending $4 on a cup of coffee.
I am all for expansion in this market, both for beer and wine.
With that said, I appear to be in the minority, but if I donāt want alcohol, the last thing Iād reach for is a NA beer or wine. I drink and enjoy those things partially because of the alcohol and the lack thereof would make me totally disinterested. When going for no alcohol, Iāll seek out sparking water, tea, or just have water.