Mixers/Non-Alcoholic
By definition, a cocktail is a mixed drink, and while there are plenty of cocktails composed entirely from alcoholic beverages, many of the best involve a mixer — a nonalcoholic juice, syrup, carbonated drink, or some other addition. A mixer’s job may be to twist the flavor of the cocktail in a different direction or to reduce the overall amount of alcohol in the cocktail — or both. While many mixers (like lime juice or simple syrup) can be easily made at home, there’s a cottage industry dedicated to ready-to-use mixers, ranging from artisan ginger ale to exotic, spiced syrups.
Top Mixers Posts:
Cocktail Artist Cocktail Mixers
The Murph’s Famous Bloody Mary Mix – Original and Hot & Spicy
Cascade Ice Zero-Calorie Mixers
These non-alcoholic sparkling wines, like many, are made in Germany (these hail from the Rüdesheim region) and sold stateside by online merchant The Zero Proof. Curiously, while the first wine on the list is bottled with a crown cap, the second has a Champagne-style cork to contend with. Otherwise, we don’t have a whole lot…
Read More
“Free AF?” We don’t have to tell you what AF stands for in today’s hip lingo: Why, it’s alcohol-free, of course. Free AF, based in New Zealand and expanding now in the U.S., is built around non-alcoholic canned wines and cocktails, all made with its propriety alcohol substitute called Afterglow, “a 100% natural botanical extract…
Read More
When is a RTD cocktail not a cocktail? When it’s a soda. These products may have the names of cocktails on the cans, but the non-alcoholic beverages are technically all sodas, as they don’t really pretend to be cocktails but rather fizzy drinks that draw inspiration from boozy drinks. All are collaborations with breweries, mostly…
Read More
Saint Viviana is retailer The Zero Proof’s proprietary line of non-alcoholic wines, made by California winemakers by dealcoholizing “fantastic wine,” and keeping additives (like oak extract) to a minimum. A white and a red are on offer. We tried both. Saint Viviana Sauvignon Blanc Dealcoholized Wine – This definitely smells the part, with a brisk…
Read More
Our friends at New Orleans’ Cocktail & Sons are known for their syrup mixers, and now the company is branching out into bitters — under the “Max Bitter” brand name. Today we’re looking at the latest cocktail sweetener from the operation, plus its three inaugural bitters offerings. Cocktail & Sons Tonic #15 – Made with…
Read More
Oddbird is the producer of some of my favorite non-alcoholic wines, and the brand recently sent two new expressions that we hadn’t yet seen, the white blend Presence and the red Addiction. We tasted them on a recent “day off” from the hard sauce. Oddbird Presence – A blend of riesling, gewurztraminer, sylvaner, viognier, and…
Read More
With non-alcoholic spirits on the rise, the aperitif space has of late taken center stage as one of the most promising sectors for exploration. We’ve encountered NA amari that are nearly indistinguishable from the real thing, so we had high hopes going into this two-fer review of Lyre’s spin on the category. Reviewed herein: One…
Read More
With the NA movement in full swing — and non-alcoholic wines getting better every day — it’s natural to ask the question: How should you store them? How long will they last? And how do you deal with open bottles? There’s lots of information on traditional (with alcohol) wine storage, but nothing I’ve ever seen…
Read More
Pentire is a UK-based brand of non-alcoholic spirits and ready-to-drink cocktails, and we open our coverage of the brand with this NA amaro, a hearty concoction made from “naturally distilled coastal botanicals carefully blended with Blood Orange, Sea Rosemary and Oakwood.” The idea, as the name of the product suggests, is to evoke the sea……
Read More
Had a really great Bloody Mary cocktail lately? I did — and when I asked my bartender for the recipe, they revealed the shocking truth: It was simply Zing Zang Bloody Mary mix and vodka. Zing Zang is a mild secret (it’s the top-selling Bloody mix in the U.S.) that I’m all too happy to…
Read More