Making non-alcoholic wine: alcohol out, taste in
A happy wine evening, everyone can still drive and no hangover the next morning? Yes, it's possible! With non-alcoholic wine. But how is non-alcoholic wine made and how does it get its taste?
First of all, everything works the same as in classic winemaking with alcohol. The ripe grapes are pressed and the grape juice is placed in a stainless steel tank with yeast for the fermentation process. The yeast converts the sugar in the grape juice into alcohol. The cloudy substances and suspended particles are then removed and the young wine is given time to mature. The maturation process can take place in an oak barrel, the stainless steel tank or the bottle. This is where the wine develops its complexity, character and taste. So far so good - but now the alcohol has to disappear from the wine again. There are several ways to do this. The most common method is vacuum distillation. The winemakers gently heat the wine in a vacuum container. This lowers the boiling temperature to around 30 degrees Celsius, the alcohol evaporates, but the aroma is retained. This method delivers the best results in terms of taste. To round off the alcohol-free wine, some winemakers also add sugar and carbon dioxide.
Another method is reverse osmosis. In this method, the wine flows through an extremely fine membrane for many hours. The alcohol is filtered out in this way and what remains is the dealcoholized wine.
By the way, in Germany, drinks with an alcohol content of less than 0.5 percent by volume are considered non-alcoholic. Since alcohol also carries flavor, non-alcoholic wines often still contain the permitted amount of residual alcohol. Only if 0.0 percent is written on the label is there really no residual alcohol left in the bottle. If you are pregnant, you should use the 0.0% versions.
THE PERFECT TASTING PACKAGE - CLICK ON THE IMAGE
