Sommelier André Hueston Mack returns for another edition of World of Wine, and this time he's putting twelve non-alcoholic beverages to the test. From ready-to-drink mocktails to non-alcoholic beer, which alternatives are worth a try?
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00:00Hey, I'm sommelier Andre Houston Mack and today I'm going to be tasting a selection
00:04of non-alcoholic, non-alcoholic? See, like, I'm allergic to it. I can't even say it. Like,
00:08it's just like, it's like, it's like. Today I'm going to be tasting a selection of non-alcoholic
00:14wines, cocktails, and spirits and more. A lot of them are going to be new to me as well.
00:23You know, this is a fast-growing segment within the industry. I think the growing
00:27push is for people just wanting to drink something without the side effects of alcohol.
00:31Ultimately, I think that these have to be pleasurable. They have to taste good in order
00:34for them to be, in my mind, to be successful. I have an open mind and I want to walk through
00:39these things with you guys and to see if we like them or what we think about them.
00:42So, first up, we have Guia. This is their original aperitif. This comes in at $38.
00:46Generally, aperitif is meant to be enjoyed before the meal as a starter. It's kind of
00:50to kickstart your palate, build your appetite, and they're generally lighter. Nothing deep or
00:54heavy or anything like that. Just light and fun and key component acid and some bitter.
00:58The bitterness kind of really helps start your appetite. Aperitifs are, in some countries and
01:02regions, definitely cultural things. I think for a lot of people, it's a mental thing too, right?
01:05I would even go so far to say that aperitif has become a lifestyle of some sorts for some people.
01:09I'm not surprised that there's a non-alcoholic market for it, but like, I mean, a Sprite
01:13can could be an aperitif, right? Like, you know what I mean? When you say non-alcoholic aperitif,
01:18it definitely elevates whatever you're talking about to a certain level for sure.
01:21They say serving size is one ounce, so we'll eyeball it here. It's definitely got you in the
01:25mind frame of like, this is a mixer. Maybe you build your drink around this thing here.
01:30Oh, wow. Okay. It's very vibrant. It's like lots of ginger on the nose,
01:35lemon hulls, lemon balm or something like that, right? But like those lemon cough syrup drops.
01:40It smells really pretty and beautiful. It smells amazing. It's not sweet at all. It is very dry
01:46and bitter. This is pretty cool. And I have to tell you that like,
01:50it would make you think that it has some alcohol in it. It has this bitter component to it. And
01:55then it kind of has like a faint thing of like Campari. Like this is not Campari, but you can
01:58see how this could be a replacement for that. Wow, it's cool. It almost seems backwards, but
02:03anytime you're making booze, like you don't have to list all the ingredients in it. This is not
02:07booze. And so you have to list the ingredients on it. There's nothing that really jumps out to me
02:11like, aha, like this is the secret sauce. These are all ingredients that at least I can say them.
02:15I can pronounce them. I've heard of them before, but that's, what's interesting to me. It just
02:19seems extraordinary that they would be able to make something like that from those ingredients.
02:22So next up we have the Guia Spritz and this comes in a four pack around $22. So this is about five
02:27or six bucks a can. And so it looks like they've taken their bitter aperitivo that we tasted
02:32earlier. They spritzed it. So they, you know, made it sparkling, fizzy and put it in a can.
02:37This represents RTD. So ready to drink category. You're starting to see a lot of this,
02:40like canned cocktails already. So you definitely see this on the alcohol side,
02:44but now you're starting to see on the non-alcoholic side. You don't have to do anything
02:46except put it in the refrigerator, crack it open, get the party started. I think it's a moneymaker
02:50for everybody. It's a new category. So the economy is excited about that. If you bought a mango in
02:55the store, that costs one price. It costs way more once they cut it up and put it into another
02:59container, but it's portable. They've done all the work for you. Looks about the same,
03:05same flavors, lots of lemon, rosemary. Oh, the lemon is just crazy. I mean, it smells
03:10really beautiful. Like I want to drink all the cans in the world by smelling this. This is
03:14something that smells good. And it's like, oh, this could be potpourri or it could be a drink.
03:18It's that powerful and floral, but beautiful. That's rocking. I mean, I would drink that.
03:24And I think just the spritz adds enough lift to it that makes it somewhat festive. And it
03:28cuts a little bit of the bitterness from like the one ounce pour that we had before. It was
03:32just kind of thick and almost felt like concentrate to some degree. Lift just like
03:36off-lips everything, makes it brighter and it's like fun, dances on your mouth. If you don't drink
03:40alcohol and you're at a table, you want to have something special with your meal. This has that,
03:43right? In all intents and purposes, yes, it's a soda, but it didn't taste like any soda that
03:47you know. So then your brain automatically puts it in another category. I believe that this is
03:51worth the price because soda doesn't make me feel a special way. Like eating a hamburger and eating
03:56a steak, right? Same thing, but just it's a different experience. This is called St. Agrestus.
04:01This is the Phony Negroni. And this comes in at five bucks a bottle. So this is 6.8 ounces.
04:06This also falls into the RTD category. So ready to drink category. Negroni, if you're not familiar
04:11with it, is a somewhat famous cocktail. Negroni is kind of one of those perfect cocktails where
04:15it's three equal parts. So there's gin, sweet vermouth and Campari. And so how do you replicate
04:20that in this? But when you take a step back and don't look at the three ingredients you start with
04:24and actually focus on what the cocktail tastes like, which is greater than the sum of its parts.
04:28But what's interesting is that this is a place that's also a distillery. They make alcoholic
04:32versions of some of those things. And so I feel like they have an inside track. This is not a
04:36company that decided that you just wanted to make this. They're already in the booze business. I think
04:40that's probably why it's well-received. So we're going to go ahead and open this up. And this is
04:43what I would say was different about a regular Negroni. It has some carbonation to it. Smells
04:48like Negroni, right? This is it, right? It tastes like grenadine, very super bitter. I mean, that's
04:55that's a Negroni. I think the only thing that would be missing a little bit, like there's some
04:59botanicals in it. It has the distinct smell and taste. If you really want the flavors of a Negroni,
05:06without the alcohol, this is it. I think for a lot of people, they might think it's alcohol in
05:10here. It doesn't have that warmthness that you get when you digest alcohol, but there's the
05:13warmthness of bitter. No, I think this is kind of genius. All right, so next up we have Amave.
05:21This is a blue agave spirit, and this comes in at $40. A blue agave is the plant that's used to
05:27make tequila. They look like a big-ass pineapple. It's something that's planted in the ground. It
05:31can't be mass produced. That endures a lot of the price. What it says here, they're using all the
05:34traditional methods of taking the plant, they're bringing it in, they're cooking them in these
05:38traditional ovens, but they don't go through the fermentation process, and so it doesn't produce
05:42alcohol. It's funny, you know, as I was perusing the bottle, you know, it's like it says owner,
05:46Lewis Hamilton. I was like, the Lewis Hamilton? That guy? And so it is somewhat of a celebrity
05:51brand and kind of makes sense. It's on brand. It's like you drive race cars for a living,
05:55like probably shouldn't be drinking and driving, right? So we're going to go ahead and open this
05:58up here. It'd be interesting to see what rules apply to this. Can they add coloring? It doesn't
06:02say anything about oak agents. I'm wondering how it picks up the color and maybe because it's,
06:05you know, the cooked pina. I don't know. You get the agave and it seems like muted. It's not like
06:09tequila. This isn't powerful coming out of the glass, but I smell something a little sweet.
06:12Vanilla is present, not extract of vanilla milkshake or vanilla ice cream that's milk.
06:19All right. Yeah, this is, this is interesting. I can't, I wouldn't imagine sipping this over ice.
06:24It has a sweetness to it. It tastes watery. Like it feels like it has no structure in that way.
06:29Um, it's coconut, coconut. That was driving me crazy. I wouldn't think that like this resembles
06:36tequila. It doesn't taste bad. There's no burn or anything like that. And I would say that that is
06:40what tequila is, but that's a merge of alcohol being present and the agave plant. I came in
06:45with an open mind, but I can't help it. If I'm reading what they actually print on the bottle,
06:49it sets me up to think tequila. Maybe I need to put it in a cocktail of it. Like, you know,
06:53to appreciate it that way. I remember the first time I ever had an impossible burger and like,
06:56they, you know, they had onions, lettuce, cheese, all that in the bun. And you eat it. And you're
07:00like, okay, that tastes like that closely resembles a hamburger. Like maybe I wouldn't be
07:04able to tell, but once you had it on its own by itself, you're like, I don't know what that is.
07:07And I think maybe the same thing here. Like maybe if we put it in a cocktail, I'm thinking margarita
07:11that you could taste it or pick it out. That ain't it player. So next up is Monday. This is zero
07:18alcohol whiskey. This comes in at $45 alcohol-free whiskey. I kind of thought that was the point,
07:23but I get it. I'm not making fun of this category. I'm interested in this. We don't
07:27know actually what it is, right? Does it really say what's in it? So to speak, this is the growing
07:32part. Like how do people identify, right? Like if I'm not drinking anymore and I'm a whiskey drinker,
07:37I don't think I want to drink a bitter aperitif. I don't want a phony Negroni. I would want
07:40something that mimics the taste of whiskey because it has whiskey on the label. That's
07:44the angle of where I'm coming in. That's what they're going for. And then I will take a few
07:47steps back and just kind of analyze it for what it is. Is this well-made? What is it about like
07:53off the first smell, it kind of smells like a cross between Whoppers and Milk Duds. We used
07:56to go to theater. My brother used to dump all the candy into the popcorn. So like no one else
08:00would eat it. Coffee, toffee, burnt sugar, brown sugar. Those aren't things that lead in whiskey.
08:05There is some vanilla, but like there's no toastiness or anything like that, that you
08:08would associate with. I think it does say on the bottle that there's been a little like time in
08:12oak and maybe that's where some of those flavors are coming from. When we talk about bourbon or
08:15we talk about wine and we talk about all these flavors and things that we find in it, just know
08:19that none of those things have been added to it. This is a little bit different in this category
08:24because things can be added to it. So when I say toffee and I say coffee, there's a good possibility
08:28that those things have been added to these or extracts or whatever there might be. There's
08:32lots of like spice, almost kind of like that burn that you get when you have too much cinnamon on
08:36your tongue. And that only really comes at the finish. And then you get, as you breathe in kind
08:40of the toffee and like some of those elements and maybe a sarsaparilla. So it's kind of like
08:45a root beer with cinnamon. Just try to put it in a layman's term. If you didn't have that at the
08:48end, then it probably just tastes like watered down root beer. I think where the beauty of these
08:51things maybe come in is like replacing them with mixers and something else. Like most people just
08:56don't sip a bottle. Most people consume it in a cocktail or a way that they like to fix it. And
09:00that would be fun. Next up is Seedlip. This is garden 108 and this comes in at $32 a bottle.
09:07Doesn't say it on the bottle, you know, it is kind of mimics the flavors that you'd find in gin.
09:11Talks about the different botanicals that it's made with. And so I would figure that it would
09:15taste very similar to gin, especially, you know, gin is really expressive. This is a 700 milliliter
09:20bottle. A standard bottle used to be 750 milliliters. The government has to approve, the people who
09:25approve the labels also have to approve what legal size bottles that you can actually bottle and put
09:30spirits in. But during the pandemic they introduced, there was a law passed that said that you could
09:34actually use 700 mls. You look at like established brands moving from 750 to 700 milliliters and then
09:41keeping the price. There's a lot of different thoughts about it, but there is that thing. And
09:44once you start to see it, I'm starting to see a lot of it now. All right, so we're going to go
09:47ahead and crack this open here. All right, that's what I'm talking about. Fresh cut grass, bright,
09:53vibrant, just feels alive. Lots of juniper, coriander, cucumber, salt, crushed sea salt,
10:00kind of like a salad in a glass. And that's it. Kind of like seltzer. On the nose it smells
10:10amazing and then on the palate is very, very light. The aromatics are totally there. I can
10:14see why it exists, right? You know, it's like it's a need for people. And you know, I think you don't
10:18know what you need until like somebody presents it to you. I'm not into the negative thing and
10:22it's nothing negative about it. It's just like when I thought about the overall thing here,
10:27like what we're selling and what's happening here. You know, this costs, you know, more than
10:30a decent bottle of gin. I'm just like... All right, moving right along. We are at Athletic Brewing.
10:38So this is Run Wild IPA. This is a non-alcoholic beer. So about 15 bucks a six pack. So that comes
10:44roughly to about $2.50 a can. I'm familiar with this brand. And to be honest with you, I was just
10:49like kind of really blown away. This actually tastes like beer. Non-alcoholic beer has come a
10:54long way. It's challenging because they want to make it a different way than they had in the past.
10:58I think, you know, anytime that you were thinking about something that was NA or non-alcoholic,
11:02the instinct was how do we take a finished beer and take the alcohol out of it? And that proved
11:06to be bad on all levels. Never good. A lot of part of what beer is, is truly about fermentation.
11:11How do you ferment the thing without having any alcohol in it? This contains less than 0.5%
11:16alcohol. There may be, there is some type of fermentation happening there and they figuring
11:20out how to cap it in a certain way. I don't know what the process is. And I think they're
11:24kind of tight-lipped about it. So it has carbonation. Looks like beer. Smells like
11:31beer. Not overly crazy hoppy, but hoppy. That's, you know, that's crisp, fresh beer. It's pretty
11:37hoppy. It's herbaceous like that. It's beer, it's crisp, but we're next to another IPA that actually
11:42has alcohol in it. That's a different game. It's weighty. It's heavier. You have the effects of
11:46alcohol. You taste it right away. Overall, great beverage. Like this is like cutting lawn, you know
11:50what I'm saying? It's like... So next up is Proxies. This is called Red Clay. This is a non-alcoholic
11:58wine alternative. This sells for $25. So we're not calling this wine. It's not wine that was made
12:04and then we took the alcohol out or anything like that. It is definitely an alternative to wine. So
12:09traditionally in this space, it used to be wine and then they run it through a machine and they
12:13de-alcohol it. And those haven't been of really great quality. Proxies wanted to do something
12:17different. Their parent company is a vinegar company. For a lot of them, they use a vinegar base
12:22and then they use teas and they use real fruit juice. In some instances, grape juices. Wine is
12:27made from fermented grapes. This doesn't go through any type of fermentation. And so I think
12:32it gives you a little bit more leeway and it's kind of fun to play around with. I do have an
12:35affiliation with the company. Early on, they tapped me to create my own blend. We make a Pinot Noir
12:39and I wanted to be able to recreate something like that, but a non-alcoholic wine alternative
12:43to that. We use Marionberry, which is a berry that's local to the Oregon area. Earl Grey teas,
12:48Oolong teas, and they have my little face on there. Come on now, you can't put me on the spot
12:52like that plant. All right, we're going to go ahead and crack this open.
12:58So this is cranberry, cran-cherry. It reminds me of like ocean spray, you know, how they have those
13:02mashups. It's so funny. We call it P-Funk, right? Like Pinot Noir can have like a little bit of
13:06funkiness to it. You know, I don't know if that comes from the vinegars or everything more from
13:10the vinegars than the tea. I actually smell Earl Grey tea here. There's a sweetness from the fruit.
13:14There's definitely acid and nuts from the vinegar. It's refreshing. So in wine, we talk a lot about
13:19balance. If one of the parts sticks out more than the other, then it's not balanced. So if the wine
13:23has too much alcohol, it's alcoholic, that's out of balance. If it's too fruit forward, then that's
13:27out of balance. If it's way too much acid, that's out of balance. And so when we talk about balance,
13:31it's about all of those being symbiotic and being at the same level. What I would say here is that
13:35the acid makes it finish up clean. Yeah, it's legit. So next up is lights. This is Sparkling
13:42Riesling. This is called Einzweig Zero, and this comes in around $18. So this is a different
13:47category. This is not a wine alternative. This is a category where it's being de-alc. This wine was
13:52made, the wines which had alcohol, and then they de-alcohol it. And that's a process that can be
13:56done in several ways. Josef Light is a well-known winemaker, top-notch guy. His wines are served in
14:00all the top restaurants in the world. I've never tasted this before. It'll be interesting for me
14:05to see how it tastes. Apples, pears, slightly smoky. I say like smoky apple, a little bit of
14:10lemon custard. It's like a cross between apple cider and like sparkling wine. Like it's not
14:15heavily apple, but there's apple there. Once you put in your mouth, it's lots of carbonation. It's
14:19fun for a second. I totally forgot that it was non-alcoholic. And the characteristic of Riesling
14:23is kerosene, petro, and it has that. I wouldn't call it gas, but like it's like petro. It's faint.
14:28You can smell it. When you think about Riesling, what most comes to mind for most people is that
14:32it's sweet. This is bone dry. Non-alcoholic wines have a certain taste, and this has it. It's not a
14:37bad thing, but it's just something I can pick up. If you're celebrating with everybody, it looks like
14:41wine, blah, blah, blah, and like everybody's happy, and everybody's joyful, and you know, you don't get
14:45the headache with it. So next up, we have Three Spirit. This is called the Nightcap, and this is a
14:51botanical elixir. So this comes in at $39 in a 500 milliliter bottle. So this is an interesting
14:57category that we're starting to see spark up. It's all about relaxing body and mind, like really
15:01pushing the health benefits, but kind of under the guise of a spirit. It talks about being a functional
15:06spirit. For me, I just take that term as like maybe you're able to move, like get things done. You know,
15:10maybe it's supposed to enlighten and give a high like that in that way. But I get this,
15:15and I understand that there's a market for this. You know, I have no idea what to expect, what's in
15:19here. Botanical extracts, Szechuan pepper, lots of different things, but I want to see how it all
15:23comes together. That's it. I think the only way to kind of find out what's going on is to open it up.
15:26We shook it up, like it says. Right off the bat, it smells like liquid Ricola. There's glitter in
15:31the glass. There's all kinds of floaties in here. Anyways, honey, lemon balm, almost kind of like a
15:36recipe for kohl's syrup or like some of those kind of remedies. The sediment in there is like
15:41something that they add that's powdery. There's like lemon balm, herbs, honey, and then at the end,
15:47there's cinnamon. It definitely has particles in it. It's made natural. It hasn't been filtered
15:52or anything like that. I think all of those are a good thing, but at the end, there's definitely
15:55some type of spice in there that kind of kicks everything up. You have habanero, so there's
16:00pepper, and then that's the Szechuan pepper. There's a little bit of heat from that. What I'll
16:05say is it doesn't taste like an alternative medicine kind of thing, right? I would drink it
16:09because it tastes good. You know, this bottle would be gone in one sitting, you know, if you ask me,
16:13but I think also that's a testament to quality and what it tastes like. It tastes good.
16:18This is Ken Spritz Energizing Flow, and this comes in at $6 a can. So this says gently
16:24caffeinated, and it has 50 milligrams. The average coffee, from what I'm told, has about 100 milligrams,
16:28so it doesn't seem that crazy to me. It does kind of fit in the category with Red Bull,
16:32all of that monster, like that kind of thing, but also because it's preaching
16:36mind-altering kind of things that maybe it falls on this side of the category,
16:40but best served socially, right? And so you don't socially drink energy drinks, right? You don't
16:45socially drink, you know, people don't corral around that, and I think people definitely corral
16:49around, you know, drinking rituals that typically involve alcohol. All right, we're gonna go ahead
16:53and crack this open. What color do you think it is? Yellow. Very herbaceous, backed with strawberries.
17:02It doesn't taste bad. There's a bitter component, like kind of wild strawberries. Yeah, I'm not sure
17:07what to make of it. It tastes like I would be drinking this because I want to get to the finish
17:11line. I want the benefit of what this would give me. I don't think that there's much pleasure in
17:15drinking it. There wasn't much pleasure in, like, the first beer I ever had, but, like, the end goal
17:19was to get from point A to point B, like, to get to the finish line on how it would make you feel.
17:23Doesn't feel like an alcohol alternative, but maybe because it has caffeine in it and that you
17:27get that oomph that some people would put it in the category. Next up is Aplos. This is called Arise.
17:32This comes in at $44, and this is also labeled as a functional non-alcoholic spirit, an alternative
17:40to drinking in your social situations as a brain stimulant. Instead of killing your brain cells
17:45with alcohol, you want to enlighten them with this functional non-alcoholic spirit. To me, what it
17:50seems like is they're marketing to smart people, right? It's like, this is your secret power, like,
17:54this is how you're gonna thrive, right? In those social settings, you're there, you're clear-minded,
17:58know what's going on, and at that price point, $44 in a kind of weird bottle, size like 575
18:04milliliters. When you break that down, that's kind of expensive per ounce. I was always taught you
18:08can't sell a $800 bottle of wine if you don't have one. All right, so we're gonna crack this
18:12open here. After today, I'm gonna be so much smarter than my years, all right? It smells like
18:17I just walked into, like, a men's fragrance store. You know when you go in the fancy bathrooms and
18:21have the incense stuck in that thing, like, that is, like, so, like, masculine and strong? That's
18:24what it kind of smells like. It's the lemon verbena. This actually smells really good. Like,
18:29cucumber. On that taste, it tastes like lemon rind. Lots of lemon zest in it. Bitter that kind
18:33of grabs a hold of you. Wheatgrass. It smells like it could be sweet, but it's not sweet at all.
18:38Feels like there's some heat coming from somewhere. It's not medicinal, and to be honest with you,
18:42it tastes, for lack of a better term, it tastes like high fashion. It would be interesting to
18:47kind of see the effects of what these have, because that's what they're selling you. Otherwise,
18:51I'd drink water, right? To pay this kind of money, you want to see the outcome of what it's
18:55selling you, right? It's like, you drink Red Bull, like, you want to be energized, right? Like,
18:58that's what they're selling you. I would keep an eye on it. Like, you know, I think this one,
19:02you'd have to jump in yourself to see if you felt any effects. It's fun and exciting to witness
19:06what's happening. This doesn't happen without a societal change and how we look at our relationship
19:11to alcohol and how we look at our relationship with our bodies, and I'm super psyched to be a
19:15part of it. This is just the tip of the iceberg. There's so many other alternatives out there,
19:18and it feels like there's new ones coming every single day.