Non-Alcoholic Wines

A Few Words on Non-Alcoholic Wines and a Few of the Better Examples

Non-alcoholic wines have become a thing, and many wineries are jumping on the bandwagon. Beekmans now has a modest collection of 20 offerings. The ones we have tasted range from OK to truly awful. The category is a work in progress; future offerings presumably will improve. You can’t just use grape juice. The fermentation process is critical for the flavors and aromas of wine. Many people wrongly assume that making non-alcoholic wine is simple: just remove the alcohol, either by reverse osmosis (pressure on one side of a filter forces the alcohol to the other side), spinning cones (essentially a centrifuge that separates the alcohol from the water; it also uses nitrogen gas), or vacuum distillation (heat under low pressure, thus a lower boiling point). It’s not that easy, because the alcohol in a wine carries with it many, if not most, of the aroma and flavor molecules. The best producers of non-alcoholic wines break down the wine into many components, remove the alcohol, and then add back specific components and other flavorings to mimic the original as best they can. This is more involved and costly than just making wine. A related assumption is that non-alcoholic wines should be relatively cheap. Just the opposite is true. To make a good one, you have to start with a better wine, because you will be losing some of the quality. Low alcohol wines have the potential to be more successful, but that category hasn’t taken off yet. A last point is that the sparkling non-alcoholic wines are more successful than the still ones; the bubbles help fill the textural gap from the missing alcohol.                                                                                                                                      

Tomorrow Cellars Rhône Blanc, Lodi-California, 2024 ($23.99) - From Californians Tracy Sweeney and David & Jen Risher, this blend of 85% Marsanne and 15% Viognier is pleasant and grape juice-like, with pear and honeysuckle. It’s just off dry. It uses the spinning cone technique and provides only 20 calories and 4 grams of sugar per glass. Wine Spectator: “The richest and roundest of the pack [that they sampled], offering delicate floral and spice accents.”

Tomorrow Cellars Red Blend, Lodi-California, 2023 ($27.59) - This is 100% Petite Sirah. Future bottlings will include some Malbec. This actually aged for 14 months in oak before the alcohol was removed by vacuum distillation. Extracts of anise and cassis were added. It’s old-world in style and very dry, with some tannin! 10 calories, 2 grams of sugar per glass.

Tomorrow Cellars Sparkling Blanc de Rhône, Lodi-California, 2024 ($27.59) - This blend of 85% Marsanne and 15% Sauvignon Blanc gets its sparkle from injected CO2. It’s pleasant enough with floral and citrus notes. It obviously doesn’t have the complexity of sparklers that are re-fermented in the bottle, but it is quite decent. 20 calories, 4 grams of sugar per glass.

We have 15-20 others, but these are the best we have tasted.