This will help you break up with booze
Finding your perfect alcohol alternative can be the key to joyful sobriety
By this point in the month, many of the people who set out with good intentions to do Dry January are drinking again. If you’ve been struggling with giving up booze, perhaps the very idea of ‘giving up’ is part of the problem. There is such an emphasis on deprivation, and far less focus on what you’re gaining.
There are plenty of reasons to enjoy freedom from booze, including more energy, better skin, sharpened concentration, fewer regrets, improved memory, saved cash, less anxiety, more restorative sleep, stronger immune system and smaller risk of developing lots of diseases including cancer. As one friend who no longer drinks told me: ‘The only thing I’ve given up is hangovers.’
Finding your perfect alcohol-free (AF) drink is a big part of reframing sobriety as a joyful thing. It’s helpful to have a replacement that scratches a similar itch, particularly if your drinking has become habitual. And the market has expanded exponentially since the idea of alcohol-free drinks being boring or unsophisticated became as dated as a restaurant without an AF drinks menu.
So I went to meet Josh Kelly of Club Soda at their alcohol-free Tasting Room & Shop on London’s Drury Lane to talk through the options…
Spirits
Gin has been the success story of AF spirits over the past decade, since Seedlip was founded in 2014 (and bought by multinational conglomerate Diageo in 2019). Now the market is flooded with juniper-infused brands, so you can be specific about what flavour you want.
‘Something like Everleaf Marine is very juniper-back, with marine flavours and a soft saltiness, so it’s perfect for mixing [a cocktail] because the juniper won’t smash the other flavours out,’ explains Josh. ‘Whereas Lyre's Dry London Spirit has the juniper forward, so it’s great for a G&T.’
Other spirits have been less well-replicated, although I love Vera, which has a delicious bitterness perfect for a no-groni. And I recently discovered Kahol, which offers alternatives to whisky, gin, rum and tequila. My husband (who likes to drink and is not doing Dry January) tried their Malt Abbey whisky, and declared it nicely smokey, with a great aftertaste. Here he is, enjoying a dram…
When it comes to AF spirits, I do think the mixer is key. Female-founded AF cocktail specialists Maya’s Bar have collaborated with Kahol to create a range of ready-mixed drinks. Their picante is *chef’s kiss* perfection: just the right mix of sweet and spicy with a tequila-y bite.
Beer
‘Beer is the second-healthiest thing you can drink in a pub, after water,’ announces Josh. 'It's just water, malt and barley or wheat. The alcohol gives you the beer belly, not the beer itself. As soon as you cut alcohol out of a product, the sugar percentage drops by at least 50%.’
Don’t forget that beer’s origin story comes from a time when clean water was not readily available. Beer was safer to drink, since the brewing process killed off any nasty bacteria. Of course the ABV of those beers, which were drunk by everyone including children, was far lower than beer that you might buy now. So if you have a low-alcohol beer, it’s actually closer to what your ancestors drank.
The other great thing about low or no-alcohol beer is that it’s easy(ish) to find in British pubs, which might not yet be stocking your favourite AF spirits or a nice kombucha. ‘Lucky Saint’s mission is to be stocked in 3000 pubs by the end of next year,’ says Josh. ‘And they’re already more than halfway there.’
There’s a huge range of other options, from Big Drop to Fungtn, which is brewed with lion’s mane mushrooms to ease anxiety (more on functional drinks shortly).
Wine
While alcohol-free beers and spirits have become a credible alternative for someone who wants a comparable product, the same has not been true of wine. I have tasted some truly disgusting AF wines, with a bouquet somewhere between vinegar and Ribena. ‘That's because the supermarkets contracted into the early brands, which were compromising with sugar,’ explains Josh. ‘So that’s what’s widely available, with the exception of Waitrose now stocking Zeno, which isn’t sweet. And Noughty is in a few of the supermarkets now, so it is changing.’
The best place to find a good selection is Club Soda, or other specialist retailers such as Wise Bartender or the Alcohol Free Co.
Interestingly, there is actually more sugar in alcohol-full wine (and beer) but regulations mean that they don’t have to list their ingredients on the bottle, whereas alcohol-free drinks do. This law is in the process of changing but, as it stands, you know what you’re getting with AF wine, in a way that you don’t with a standard bottle of Shiraz.
Moderato Merlot-Tannat Cuvée Révolutionnaire is that rare thing, an AF red wine that tastes like a wine. You can imagine having this with your pasta, and it’s just 0.5%.
However, I tell Josh that my favourites have been the sparkling wines, such as Wild Idol, and he explains there’s a reason for this.
‘Sparkling wines have been so much more successful than still wines because carbonation does the same job as alcohol - it carries flavour,’ he says. ‘Think of a cola. It tastes interesting when it's carbonated but, the next morning when it’s flat, it tastes awful. The ingredients haven't changed; the bubbles have gone, so how the flavours hit your palate has been dulled down. Those bubbles literally bounce it across your tongue. Which is why sparkling wines arrived successfully way before still wines did, and why many of the still wine brands have 0.5% alcohol.’
This is particularly interesting because there are small amounts of alcohol in lots of things: sourdough bread, live yoghurt, some soft drinks, even a banana. If a drink is being marketed as a low or no-alcohol beer, wine or spirit, then they legally have to put the ABV on the bottle, even though it might contain less alcohol than a ripe banana, which can be 1.4% ABV.
There is also a variety of drinks that Josh describes as ‘wine-shaped’ which are not designed to taste exactly like wine, but can play a similar role, notably the Blurred Vines ‘alt-wines’ from Three Spirit. With a blend of teas, herbs, adaptogens, amino acids, fruits and ferments; they also come under the functional category.
Functional drinks
The fastest-growing sector of the AF market contains ingredients that provide a buzz, such as nootropics or adaptogens. For example, Sentia is made from a blend of botanical ingredients designed to stimulate the brain’s GABA system and help you relax without alcohol.
‘When you have your first shot of alcohol, about 20 minutes after that is when you get a positive experience - relaxation, giddiness or conviviality,’ explains Josh. ‘That is the experience that everyone's looking for but, when you have your second full measure of alcohol, the GABA trigger this time is more negative, and it's a downward spiral. Then, because you're chasing that initial positive response, you keep drinking - and that’s when it can lead to crying or aggression.’ What brands like Sentia and Haelu have done is create that single GABA trigger, so you don’t get drunk, and you avoid that spiral.
These drinks can be something of an acquired taste (not unlike alcohol in that respect) but I do love Three Spirit, which has three hero products:
Livener provides energy with guayusa, guava leaf and schisandra.
Social Elixir elevates your mood with lion’s mane, yerba mate and damiana.
Nightcap calms your system with valerian root and adaptogenic lemon balm.
As a general rule, mix a lighter-coloured spirit with a lighter-coloured mixer like tonic, and a darker spirit with a darker mixer like ginger ale. Some of these drinks, like Three Spirit’s Nightcap or Kahol’s malt whisky, can be sipped straight, over ice.
Importantly, Josh says that all AF spirits must be kept in the fridge once opened, as they don’t have the alcohol as a preservative.
The effect of these botanicals is obviously more gentle than the instant impact of alcohol, particularly if you’ve been a heavy drinker for a while, so don’t expect a ‘champagne effect’ from the very first sip. Prolonged alcohol use can inhibit GABA in the brain (which explains the unrelaxing hangover paranoia) so, the less you drink, the more receptive you will be to these functional alternatives. Which is an incentive to stick with/restart Dry January, right?
Ferments
Fermented drinks are not only good for your gut; they also have a satisfying bite that makes them an excellent alcohol alternative. I’m a big fan of water kefir, made from fermented grains, and kombucha, made from tea.
And, if you’re becoming more open-minded about what might go in a wine glass: don’t knock sparkling tea until you’ve tried it.
You might be surprised to learn that vinegar makes an excellent base for grown-up drinks. ‘The reason that alcohol is there in the first place is first to preserve the liquid, and also to make the flavour sing,’ says Josh. ‘And shrubs, made from vinegar, are as good, if not better, a flavour-carrier than alcohol.’
Shrub is the basis of ready-to-drink Shrb, and Mother Root’s switchel, which you can serve with soda, tonic or ginger ale.
Fermented drinks are probably my favourite category here and, if there’s kombucha on the menu, I’m not even tempted by booze.
I hope this guide has inspired you to experiment with more alcohol-free drinks. To learn more, you can book your own tailored tasting at Club Soda on Drury Lane
This week I’m…
Getting through this month thanks to the knowledge that, with each day, we are getting a minute or two of extra daylight ☀️
Wondering if experimental artist Marina Abramovich’s new wellness brand is part of a big art spoof?
Getting productive with Timeboxing: The Power of Doing One Thing at a Time by Marc Zao-Sanders (while wondering if reading productivity books is my most ridiculous form of procrastination).
Thank you! I’m going to give that red wine a try.
Ooh thankyou for that, I had no idea my Three Spirits needed to be kept in the fridge and some other AF concoctions to try 🥂👍