The best zero percents for summer.
Here are my non-alcoholic drink recommendations for these party months.
We’re having a good summer.
Everywhere I look, I see herds of near-naked people basking in the sunshine. The canals are busy with swimmers, the parks heavy with green. Amsterdam has become a party.
For non-drinkers though, summertime can be tough. As a non-drinker myself, I’m rarely what some people would call ‘triggered’ – the itchy feeling of wanting a drink while sober – but around this time of year, when the afternoons ooze into the evenings and the world smudges into something impressionistic, I begin to wonder about a glass of something cold and bubbly.
My drinking was never problematic. I didn’t have to stop, I simply chose to. But I also know that one glass of champagne easily leads to another, and while I’m not in danger of finding myself awake three days later on a rooftop hoofing ‘shrooms with a new best mate called Sabina, I am in danger of inviting back in the general malaise that drinking fostered within me.
It’s interesting that we’re increasingly seeing a mosaic of approaches to not-drinking, rather than the black-and-whiteness of sobriety. I meet a lot of people, like me, who don’t want to drink but who don’t need AA either (sobriety, as a hard rule, is rightly crucial for some). And I’m comfortable being somewhat loose with the definition of not-drinking: if you don’t drink 95% of the time but you do have a glass of wine three times a year, then I’d still say you don’t drink because, generally speaking, you don’t. To encourage not-drinking, which I think should be encouraged, we need to recognise this middle ground more.
Thankfully, INABs, or interesting non-alcoholic beverages, are still booming. It seems that every week another producer pops up, and many of the drinks they’re concocting are pure nectar. I wanted to update my list of recommendations for anyone also feeling the itch, or for anyone wanting to cut down or cut out, or for anyone who simply doesn’t want to drink tonight. It’s a broad umbrella, so come and join us.
Willem’s Wermoed is a Dutch vermouth company that now offers an alcohol-free aperitif as part of their range. It’s flavoured with orange and grapefruit. I have to say, as someone who’s now drunk a lot of non-alcoholic aperitifs, this one’s near the top of the pile in terms of flavour. It’s complex and very bitter, like sucking on citrus rind. That makes it hard to down, forcing you to savour it. I don’t find it cloying either. Mixed with some sparkling water and a few tinkles of ice, this is my summer drink. I also rate Abstinence, especially their blood orange and bittersweet, which works very well as one-third of a Nogroni.
That said, too many non-alcoholic options are bitters designed to be mixed. It’s a relief then that Three Spirit has come up with something like a liquor. I’m referring to The Nightcap, which tastes woody and old, something to sip on while listening to a record, feet nestled in a sheepskin rug. Y’know, that kind of thing. It describes itself as ‘functional,’ as if it might produce a noticeable relaxing effect, which is a bit much. No drink other than alcohol offers anything psychoactive (perhaps THC drinks but for some reason Europe is squeamish about these). Promising anything else is misleading. Still, I really rate The Nightcap, especially poured over a single ice cube the size of a fist.
The recommendation I get asked most for? Good non-alcoholic red wines. I’m afraid to say: there are none. The closest to passable is Cognato’s Cabernet Sauvignon. It lacks the thin, sugary, astringent horror show quality of other de-alcoholised wines, and manages to retain the tanniny tear of alcoholic wine. If you don’t concentrate too hard, it just about passes. I had mine with a massive roast, complete with cauliflower cheese of course, which helped. If you want good wine alternatives, I think it’s better to avoid the imitations. Feral, for example, doesn’t bother trying to produce fake-wines. They’re produced in the Dolomites (so chic), and are made from fermented beets, which means they’re complex and strange, but in a good way. They pair well with food and are best drunk from a wine glass, meaning you can dust off your RIEDELs.
Sticking with wine alternatives, I rate CUL SEC, who use grapes as their base ingredient. They taste like natural wines, being quite funky and farmy, and murky with sediment too. But there’s something distinctly non-winey about them, which I like, thanks to the addition of other lacto-fermented ingredients like celery, rhubarb and tomato. I’ve found with CUL SEC that a bottle doesn’t last long – drinkers reach for it too.
In beer and cider, which I don’t drink as much of, I like SOUR B by BOUCHE, which is a heady beer made with wild yeasts and black tea. It has a thick mouthfeel and great body but the sourness is what keeps me coming back, it’s an absolute assault on the tongue in the best possible way. If you prefer cider, try Ambijus, a Norwegian drink made of concentrated apple juice, tasting quite like apple vinegar but with notes of forest (the ingredient list is bougie as hell). It’s like apple juice for adults but it does, ever so slightly, begin to wear after a glass.
Finally, I want to shout out the espresso tonic, which isn’t a new drink but I had one with my lunch in Menorca and was reminded how punchy it is, being bitter and black, yet propped by the underlying sweetness and fizz of the tonic. Better yet, the espresso will give you a kick – hooray. The only place I’ve seen doing these in Amsterdam is Five Ways, but I wouldn’t want one as morning coffee, this is a late afternoon into evening drink (if you can hack caffeine that late).
Happy not-drinking!
OK BYE!
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Koffie van Kees at Noordoogst also does several special coffee drinks 👌
rhubarb rose yes pls!