This article contains affiliate links, which means we may earn a small commission if a reader clicks through and This gorgeous, tingling, finely detailed example has a spicy mandarin and mineral zip. Regularly clocking in below 8%, the best off-dry and medium-sweet German rieslings are among the world’s finest white wines. This well-made alkohol-frei has both, but its foaming sweetness is freshened with acidity making it more than adult pop.īEST BUY: Dr Loosen Graacher Himmelreich Spätlese, Mosel, Germany 2018 (£24.99, or £21.99 as part of a mix six, .uk) If one way of compensating for the lack of mouthfeel in non-alcoholic wines is to add sugar, another is to have bubbles. Now it’s very much on the lighter side, although there’s no lack of graphite-etched red- and blackcurranty fruit in this cabernet franc.įritz Müller Zero Alcohol Frizzante, Germany 2017 (£10.99, Virgin Wines)

Until quite recently, an alcohol of 12.5% would have been considered about average for a red wine. Les Nivières Saumur, Loire, France 2018 (£9.49, Waitrose) Thanks to clever work in the vineyard, the alcohol in this typical Marlborough sauvignon is down to 9.5%, but the gooseberry and passion-fruit flavours are no less vividly intense than you’d find in a wine of several degrees more abv. Vale dos Pombos Vinho Verde, Portugal 2018 (£6, The Co-op)įrom Portugal’s cooler, greener north, vinho verde is a useful style to get to know if you’re looking for lower alcohol: this example clocks in at 9.5%, and its slight spritz and exuberant orange citrus and tropical fruit tang is moreishly refreshing.įorrest The Doctors’ Sauvignon Blanc, Marlborough, New Zealand 2018 (£8.99, Waitrose Tesco) The Natureo range from Spain’s Torres family has been my go-to as the most convincing and palatable of the 0% wines for some time now, with the muscat, which retains its natural floral-grapey aromas, the fragrant pick of the bunch. Torres Natureo Dealcoholised Muscat, Spain 2018 (£5.99, Morrisons Waitrose) Here’s a more rational (or, at least, more enticing) response to Christmas’s excess: rather than a dry January, here’s to more of a month of off-dry German riesling. Indeed, the EU’s exceptions on minimum alcohol include a style of wine that naturally clocks in at as little as 7.5% abv, but, thanks to its steely acidity, carries its sugar without really feeling sweet. This is thanks to intensive work controlling leaf growth in the vineyard.īut, if we’re looking to cut down on alcohol but not on wine, we shouldn’t get too hung up on sugar. The Doctors’ wines, by contrast, stand out by maintaining a voluptuous mouthfeel at sub-10% abv without recourse to excessive sugar. As for the comparably fuller texture, for the most part, Forrest says, a compensating dose of sugar does the mouth-filling work. It’s just that they’re already starting from a position that is much closer to zero. Brewers too have managed to extract 4-5% abv. But it doesn’t quite account for the fact that alcohol-free beers taste so much more convincing, with a genuinely beer-like mouthfeel and depth of flavour.įorrest says that’s a slight illusion. This helps explain why almost all 0% alcohol “wines”, which have had their alcohol – I’m tempted to say their “soul” – removed by a range of not at all gentle techniques, from centrifuges to organic solvents, taste so thin and simple. Dr John Forrest, a New Zealand winemaker who makes a successful range of lower-alcohol wines, stresses the importance of alcohol’s ability “to add a sweetness to the aroma, ripeness to the fruit flavours and weight and ‘oily’ mouthfeel”.įorrest reckons the very best you can do is drop around 5% abv to the EU minimum level – as he does in his own The Doctors’ wines – before you lose that texture and the effects of what he calls the “secondary chemical interactions” of alcohol in wine, from the feel of the tannins to the complexity of its aromas.

A wine without alcohol is missing other elements besides the buzz.

Names of dry white wine