Sober Curious

As someone who has never been sober curious and also hadn’t actually heard that phrase until just recently. Non-alcoholic and dealcoholized wines have never even crossed my mind. I guess I just always thought alcohol was part of the fun!

The first time I had a summer vacation as an adult it was an amazing experience. The freedom I had was on a whole other level. When I was in college I always had a job. In the summers I often had two or three. I wasn’t travelling, or having lounge days around the house. I was working everyday and saving for the school year when I wouldn’t have as much time to work.

Summer vacation as an adult was something else. I was still getting paid so I could do all the things I wanted……and still have money! The negative being that the first summer really took a toll on my liver. I was drinking a lot, going to the beach, hanging with friends, sleeping in, not working out. I was having fun, but it was a bit much. Non-Alcoholic anything, let alone non-alcoholic wine wasn’t even a thought in my summer break brain.

Making Changes

As I’ve grown older I’ve realized that I do appreciate not drinking as much. When I do I will often slack on my workouts, feel fuzzy brained, and occasionally depressed. That being said I do appreciate the taste of a good beer, cocktail, or glass of wine. I also appreciate that there are many people out there who do not want to drink at all, but like to go out with their friends and don’t want to be stuck drinking water all of the time. While doing research for the blog I found some things I never even knew existed! This includes the fact that there are two different types of non-alcoholic wine. These two types are non-alcoholic and dealcoholized wines.

“Wines” TÖST and Ariel Vineyards

Non-Alcoholic Wine

Non-alcoholic and dealcoholized wines are very different. The non-alcoholic wine starts as grape juice and is never fermented. It has a flavor profile that is unlike most traditional wines. The fermentation process is what gives wine most of it’s flavors and aromas. As I looked at some of the non-alcoholic wine reviews and their own websites I realized that they almost all agree that while they market themselves as non-alcoholic wine, the flavor really is not like wine. There are a few companies out there that will say their rosé tastes very close to a traditional rosé, but I think that might be hard to find.

Where To Find Non-Alcoholic Wine

Living in Hawaii is sometimes difficult when it comes to finding things that are niche. I went to MULTIPLE stores before I found one that carried a true non-alcoholic wine. There was only one brand on island that I could find and that was a company called TÖST. Thank you TÖST for your store locator and Foodland in Kailua for actually carrying it. Every other store I went to only carried dealcoholized wines. I purchased a small bottle of TÖST rosé and did a taste test with a small group of people.

Everyone in the group loved the white tea, ginger and elderberry flavors together. One person in the group suggested it was almost peach like. We wouldn’t ever say that it tasted like rosé, but it had a nice bit of effervescence, it was light, easy to drink and had a really great flavor. With only 40 calories in an 8.5 oz service, it’s even better than drinking juice. The non drinkers in our group said that they would appreciate this drink to have something different than just sparkling water at the neighborhood block parties. The drinkers in the group said they would buy it at 7-Eleven if it was offered.

It’s a refreshing beverage and everyone was happy that it didn’t have any high fructose corn syrup, the sweetener included is cane sugar. The price point is a bit high considering it’s lack of alcohol and if I were to buy it again I would definitely get the bigger bottle. One person in our group said that she would definitely be buying it soon! Foodland had it for $4.29 for the 8.5 oz. size. You can also find it on Amazon if you can’t find it at your local store. Also check out their recipes for some mocktails on their website!

Dealcoholized Wine

Dealcoholized Wine goes through the entire process of regular wine including fermentation which produces alcohol. After the fermentation process is complete, the alcohol is removed from the wine utilizing a variety of methods such as reverse osmosis, vacuum distillation, or spinning cone technology. With these methods, not ALL of the alcohol is removed from Dealcoholized Wines, but it is only about 0.5% remaining. The process to remove the alcohol impacts the flavor a bit, but is much closer to the standard flavors and aromas of a regular wine.

Where to Find Dealcoholized Wine

Finding dealcoholized wines around the island was relatively easy. There was a pretty good selection at Whole Foods and my local liquor store. I chose Ariel Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon to try as their label said they’d won awards against other wines with alcohol in them. I figured what the heck, this could be good!

Ariel Vineyards describes their cabernet sauvignon as “aromas of black currants, cherry, blueberries and chocolate, with soft tannins and a dry finish.” Our group did a blind taste test of Ariel Cabernet Sauvignon against Yellow Tail Cabernet Sauvignon. Choosing the Yellow Tail was deliberate as I wanted the two wines to be a similar price point. Both were within the $10 range. I wanted to see whether people in the group could tell which one had alcohol and which one did not. From the very first whiff of the Ariel wine, the group knew that it did NOT have alcohol in it.

The feedback initially was that the flavor was a bit flat and lacking. One person had a great idea to add some seltzer water to it and WOW it made a huge difference. My suggestion with this wine is to turn it into a wine spritzer. The carbonation opens up the flavors and makes it a refreshing drink. I wouldn’t say it tastes exactly like wine, but it has a nice hint. One group member who hardly ever drinks wine said that would definitely be buying dealcoholized wine. She mentioned that while she wouldn’t drink it on a regular basis. But if she was at the liquor store getting ready for a party, she would pick up a bottle for herself to enjoy. With 52 calories per serving, this is also a low calorie alternative to consuming a wine with alcohol in it which averages about 120 calories.

How To Read The Labels

Sometimes the labels on these wines can be confusing. Dealcoholized wine will be labeled as dealcoholized or it might say “alcohol removed wine”. Non alcoholic wine might label themselves as a  rosé, but on the same bottle basically describe the flavors you’ll be tasting and then say that it has no alcohol.

Overall Thoughts

Overall though we decided that while these could be good options for something different to drink. Especially if you want to have a glass of wine in your hand. They are not really a perfect substitute for a glass of wine. Keep in mind, we only tried a few different options so there might be better non alcoholic and dealcoholized wines, but I think it’s going to be hard to achieve perfection. Which, as I always tell my students, perfection isn’t always necessary!