With a push from the young and sober, mocktails that take hold
NEW YORK (AP) – Five years ago, for its 27th anniversary, Lorelei Bandrovschi gave up drinking for a month on tour. She was a casual drinker and thought it would be easy. It was, but she hadn't been knocked to learn so much about herself in the process.
"I realized that going out without a drink was something I really liked and that I was very well suited to," she told The Associated Press. "I realized that I am a pretty outgoing, spontaneous, uninhibited person."
And that's how Listen Bar was born in downtown Bleecker Street. The bars that Bandrovschi opens only once a month are just under one-year-old alcohol-free, one of a growing number of sober bars that are popping up around the country.
Liquor-free bars serving high "mocks" attract more young people than ever before, especially women. The uptick comes as fewer people drink alcohol from home and the #MeToo movement has women seeking a more comfortable living environment, said Amanda Topper, assistant director of food service research for the global market research firm Mintel.
Mocktails don't just spread on sober bars. Ordinary bars and restaurants point to the idea that non-alcoholic customers want more than a Shirley Temple or a splash of cranberries with a spritz.
Alcohol-free mixed drinks grew by 35 percent as a drink type on the menus for bars and restaurants from 2016 to this year, according to Mintel. Topper said that 17 percent of 1,288 people surveyed between the ages of 22 and 24 who drink from home said they were interested in spotting.
The interest, she said, is also partly driven by the health and wellness movement, and the availability of higher quality ingredients, as bartenders take mockery more seriously.
"It started a few years ago with the whole idea of dry January, when consumers cut out alcohol for that month," Topper said. "It's a shift to a long-term movement and lifestyle choice."
Listen Bar recently hosted a mocktail competition for mixologists, whipping up drinks that included The Holy Would, consisting of citrusy, distilled, non-alcoholic Seedlip Grove 42, palo santo syrup, low acid apple juice, lemon and lime bitters produced with glycerin, and verjus, squeezed juice of unripe grapes. The drink is the brainchild of Fred Beebe, a bartender on Sunday in Brooklyn. The restaurant is not alcohol-free, but Beebe helped create an extensive mocktail menu that goes far beyond the sugary choices of yore, with unique ingredients.
Palo santo, for example, is a tree native to Peru, Venezuela and Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula that loosely translates to "sacred wood" and is widely used in folk remedies.
"Everyone should have a nice drink at the bar," Beebe said. "Hospitality makes everyone feel good. To me, alcohol is not the most important part of a cocktail anymore. The cool juices and syrups and tinctures and mixtures and all that makes it a lot of fun."
Listen Bar has enjoyed of packed houses every month. Photographer Zach Hilty, 40, was a first-time guest on competition night. He said he occasionally drinks alcohol.
"My boyfriend and I are interested in the health benefits of various botanicals and such, "he said.
Cat Tjan, 27, of Jersey City, New Jersey, was also on hand and picked up a colleague, Ammar Farooqi, 26, of Williamstown, southern New Jersey. Drinking neither alcohol. Tjan said Listen Bar is the only sober bar she could find in Manhattan, where she works for a pharmaceutical company.
"I have no interest in it," she said of the liquor. "It's not very funny. It is very expensive. There are better ways to have a good night. "
Many bartenders will mix regular cocktails and only leave the alcohol out if you ask, but it's different than choosing something thought of as a virgin from a separate menu," Farooqi said. Mocktails generally cost a few dollars less than cocktails, but separate menus are still difficult to find.
In the sober bar Getaway in the Greenpoint area of Brooklyn, mocktails cost $ 13 a pop. There's Paper Train, with lemon juice, tobacco syrup (from the leaf and contains no nicotine), vanilla and San Pellegrino Chinotto. And it's a trip to Ikea, a mix of lingonberry, lemon, vanilla, cardamom and cream. Getaway opened in April in a fixed room.
"The weekends are generally very busy," said co-owner Regina Dellea. "My business partner's brother is improving, and when he first sober, they wanted to have a place to hang out at night, where you could meet up and just talk."
Mainstream vendors catch. Beer companies are experimenting with alcohol-free choices, and Coca-Cola North America released the popular sparkling mineral water from Topo Chico. Britain's Seedlip brand names itself as the world's first non-alcoholic liquor. It comes in three flavor profiles with ingredients such as hand-picked peas from founder Ben Branson's farm in the English countryside.
At Listen Bar, Tjan and Farooqi sipped a mocktail called Me, A Houseplant, a green blend consisting of Seedlip & # 39; s Garden 108 black (the one with the peas), cucumber, lemon and wildflower flower. Each glass was decorated with a hefty cucumber slice. It was thought up by Jack McGarry, co-founder of the liquor-serving Dead Rabbit bar in lower Manhattan and a famous mixologist.
McGarry is also three years sober. At Listen Bar "Good AF Awards" he was one of the judges, the clipboard in his hand.
“Alcohol-free used to be very simplified, like homemade lemonade and ginger beer. People want more diverse offers, ”he said. "I am fascinated by how it will all shake out. I have seen many trends come and go. When people come and ask for non-alcoholic drinks, we have a bunch of drinks that are well thought out."
Chris Marshall in Austin, Texas , has been sober since 2007. He was once a drug and alcohol counselor whose clients often shared their frustration at not having an alcohol-free nightstand too often, his motivation for founding Sans Bar in Austin, with pop-ups all over country, including Anchorage, Kansas City, Washington, DC, Portland, Seattle, New York, Nashville and St. Louis.
"The response is just overwhelming," he said. "We take out common areas, coffee shops and such places. The lack of a social circle is the thing so many of my clients lacked after treatment. ”
Marnie Rae Clark, who lives outside Seattle, is also a healthy alcoholic. She experienced the struggle to be social while sober, and started a blog about the sober lifestyle of 2017. She founded National Mocktail Week this year. Part of her job is to encourage bars and restaurants to start up mocktail games.
"I just want to be able to go out with my friends and have a nice, sophisticated adult cocktail," said 51-year-old Clark. "It's really about promoting inclusion and affiliation in the hospitality industry."
