8 minute read
7: Low and no
How low can you go?
by Paul Mathew, Creator of Everleaf non-alcoholic aperitifs
Ten years ago, when The Cocktail Lovers magazine launched, I was bartending in Beijing, working for start-up bar and restaurant operations and a few drinks brands that were all joining China’s relatively new, but flourishing cocktail scene.
It was exciting, with new ingredients to discover (baijiu, yangmei, konjac and jujube to name a few) and new guests to serve – with their new perspectives. Guests have their idiosyncrasies wherever you are, but one that stood out at the time was the notuncommon request for less alcohol in a cocktail. Coming from London, I was more used to being implored to add a splash more, or having the occasional drink sent back with the accusation that I’d scrimped on the pour. This was a new one.
I liked it though. They wanted the occasion of drinking a cocktail, of the ritual, the effort that went in to the serve, and the time taken to pair it with their mood or occasion, just not the intoxication – something we’d been encouraging for the previous five years at The Hide in London, with our mantra of encouraging people to broaden their drinking horizons; drink less, but better. With smaller spirit pours though, I needed the intensity of flavour from elsewhere, and started an array of reductions, macerations, infusions and tinctures that I would draw from. From then on, I always made sure my drink lists had a variety of strengths, from no-through-low to full. This fitted the way the cocktail world was changing worldwide. More and more guests were picking mixed drinks, and cocktail culture was expanding into more venues and occasions (no doubt in part due to the influence of The Cocktail Lovers!). Looking back when writing this piece, I came across a trends article I wrote in 2013 that said, “With more opportunities to drink and a wider variety of consumers, perhaps we need to lighten up a little… Less can mean more”. I hadn’t anticipated how apt that might be five years later.
2013 also saw the publication of The Art of the Shim: Low-Alcohol Cocktails to Keep You Level by Dinah Sanders, which celebrated the lower ABV serve. “This book is your invitation to a world of delicious, sophisticated drinks which provide all their pleasures without walloping you over the head with booze,” it said (an invitation I took to heart), and it was about this time I felt we started seeing a lot more appearing on menus, not just at the very high-end venues, but more widely.
Back in London, we were seeing the same changes in our guests’ preferences at our venues. The lower ABV drinks were getting increasingly popular, and we were making our own tonics and botanical extracts that would eventually go on to become Everleaf.
Others were a step ahead, and no look back at low- and no- would be complete without a mention of Seedlip, launched by Ben Branson in 2015, pretty much single-handedly creating a new category of non-alcoholic alternatives. Ben managed to overcome two huge hurdles, firstly in the production process (trust me when I say making a non-alc product isn’t as straightforward as you might think), and secondly in convincing the bartending world to embrace non-alc. The way I’ve described it, you’d have thought the trade was just waiting for a product like this to come along, but I think we were pretty hard to convince as an industry in the early days.
Our guests definitely showed us there was demand though, and as this grew, I wanted to be able to offer them something on a par with anything we had on our back bar, both in flavour profile and complexity, but also provenance and story.
I was brought up surrounded by plants. My father spent his career working as a botanist at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and would regularly disappear to far-flung parts of the world to study, collect and even name new species as I was growing up. This led me into the field of conservation biology where I worked for almost 10 years, also travelling around the world, but this time looking more at how people use plants, and how we could ensure their continued survival (bartending was the sideline at this point!). Eventually, the draw of the bar took over, but I’d always wanted to combine those worlds of plants and drinks. This seemed like the perfect opportunity.
For the original Everleaf (now the Forest variety), I drew heavily from this background. I researched a lot of aperitif recipes and what plants they were using. I was particularly fascinated by texture and looked at what plants could help contribute to mouthfeel and carry flavour; I dehydrated, boiled, cooked, macerated and infused, using things from the garden, as well as more traditional botanicals. I knew I wanted it to be bitter (something that carries so well in non-alc, and that cues all those adult flavours) but also complex and aromatic. Something rich and full-bodied that offered something unique to a bartender.
Gentian root was there for bitterness, saffron for colour, seaweed and acacia gum for texture, vanilla and chamomile for sweetness, and vetiver and orange blossom for aroma. Iris/orris root to hold everything together – the glue that helps so many gins and perfumes. There were many other pieces to it though – I liken the ingredients to a natural ecosystem where everything is essential, playing a role and making the whole more than the sum of the parts (“everything in the forest is the forest”, to quote novelist Richard Powers in The Overstory). Orris root and saffron were particularly emotive, coming from plants I’d grown up with while Dad was writing about them (The Iris (1981) and The Crocus (1982) by Brian Mathew).
This R&D phase took most of 2018, tasting samples with our guests at The Hide, as well as finding sustainable sources for our ingredients, with the first bottles finally launching in January 2019 – and almost immediately selling out. In fact, they kept doing that for the next six months as Everleaf – and the category – grew, supported in no small part by the great bars and bartenders who loved the liquid and helped drive awareness. Sounds like an acceptance speech, but I really couldn’t have lasted without that!
No/low as a category saw sales rise by 506% from 2015 to 2020 (Nielsen 2020), and total volume is forecast to grow by another 31% by 2024 (IWSR 2021). It’s now rare to find a bar without at least one premium non-alc alternative, and the number of brands is growing fast (there are something like 50 UK-based non-alcoholic spirit alternatives now). As a bartender, what excites me about this is the variety of brands expanding the category: Three Spirit launched just before us, looking at the power of plants to influence mood; Æcorn at a similar time to us, with three bitter, smoky and dry aperitifs’ and more recently, Crossip’s three styles with unapologetically bold flavours.
We grew Everleaf last year too, adding Marine and Mountain to our range. We drew inspiration from those environments to create a crisp and refreshing aperitif packed full of seaweed umami and bergamot, and a vibrant and aromatic rosé vermouth-style aperitif using fermented cherry blossom and rosehip, respectively. They’ve been incredibly well received, offering unique flavours I felt weren’t already common in alcoholic products.
I didn’t set out to make a ’good non-alcoholic alternative’ with Everleaf; the goal has always been to make the best-tasting drink I can, but one that just happens to be nonalcoholic. Sometimes bartenders use them for non-alc options, sometimes it’s low ABV; other times it’s full-strength, whether that’s a dash of Marine in a Martini (the salinity and olive-leaf bitterness work beautifully) or Mountain in a Manhattan. It’s this blurring of boundaries that I think is key to the evolution of low- and no-. It’s not about drinking or not drinking; it’s about being free to make choices that don’t impact the quality of your experience. It’s about normalising moderation as part of our wider approach to wellness and health. The category has grown up, and we should expect to have sophisticated and delicious options, whatever we choose.
Three favourite serves
Forest Spritz
After three years of drinking it, Forest still surprises me with its different flavours that seem to change depending on situation, venue and mood. I tend to drink it in our signature serve: with light tonic and a wedge of fresh orange in a wine glass over ice.
Alpenglow
This is an elegant aperitif to sip while you watch the sunset reflect off the mountains! Add 50ml chilled Everleaf Mountain to a Coupe or Flute glass, top with chilled kombucha (Real Kombucha’s Royal Flush with its rhubarb and white peach notes is a favourite here), then garnish with fresh strawberry (or dehydrated strawberry dust).
Palomino
Marine is neither a tequila nor gin alternative, but it does work well in cocktails meant for either. I find its savoury salinity and bright bergamot works beautifully with grapefruit soda, making this my warmweather go-to twist on a Paloma (also great with some tequila for a low ABV serve). Build in a Highball glass, adding ice, 50ml Everleaf Marine and 150ml grapefruit soda (try Two Keys Pink Grapefruit Mixer, or Franklin & Sons Pink Grapefruit Tonic Water with Bergamot for a more bitter twist). Garnish with a thyme sprig or twist of pink grapefruit.
ABOVE: Forest Spritz
