If you’re on a health kick but haven’t quite worked out how to manage your nightly G&T aperitif or red wine rendezvous, you’ll love the top-shelf new trend in non-alcoholic wines, spirits and beers.
There’s alcohol-free gins, whiskeys, wines, beers and even sparkling from Champagne (minus the drunk bubbles!). And, there’s a load of healthy bonuses to drinking the 0% variety, too.
Here, 4 reasons to make the switch
1. You’ll feel social
Australians love nothing more than having a few beers after work mates, a vino and a catch up with friends, a glass or two with our work colleagues over lunch … it’s embedded in our culture and for many people, it goes hand-in-hand (pun intended) with being social. Not to mention the alcoholic affect – which can boost conversation and confidence for many in matter of sips. But, if you’re trying to manage your weight, or reduce your alcohol intake for health or other reasons, ‘not drinking’ can feel anti-social.
Solution: the alcohol-free wine, beer or spirit! Who’s to know your glass of red served up in crystal stemware won’t result in slurred words?
2. You can still unwind
Isn’t it ironic that the same beverage that makes so many of us social is also used by so many of us in isolation – to wind down at the end of a hard day, or to relax with after – or over – dinner. But alas, your party with one can still go on …! You see, the ritual or ‘act’ of making the cocktail/pouring the wine/cracking the beer and sipping your beverage can continue. The taste is all but the same. The ritual is exactly the same. It’s just the hangover that’s absent.
3. You can manage your weight better
According to The Australian Calorie Counter, you should avoid or strictly limit alcohol if you are trying to lose weight. That’s because alcohol contains sneaky sugars that stack up to big kilojoules – especially if you don’t stop at one glass. And excess kilojoules are stored as fat.
To put that into context, the average female adult (depending on age, build, muscle, body and other factors) requires around 8000kJ per day, according to Nutrition Australia.
Now if you consider the amount of kilojoules in these figures from the Healthy Food Guide, you can see how weight management combined with a few alcoholic drinks nightly can cause weighty issues:
- 150ml glass red wine (13% alc. vol) = 489kJ
- 30ml gin & 170ml diet tonic = 284kJ
- 355ml bottle cider (5% alc. vol) = 744kJ
- 375ml bottle full-strength beer (4.8% alc. vol) = 564kJ
Now, that’s not to say that you should guzzle down a bottle of the non-alcoholic brew because you won’t gain weight – they still contain kilojoules, but less. You’re also less likely to ‘over-drink’ and less likely to make unhealthy alcoholic-affected food choices because you’ll be clear headed.
4. No hangover! No regrets! No slurred words or loose tongue wagging!
Oh the dreaded hangover … the years of experience you may have drinking fine wines, craft beers, G&Ts or Whiskey Macs mean nothing when it comes to the morning after ‘too many’. Hangovers are indiscriminate. And it certainly feels that the older we get the worse they feel. But you can skip all that with alcohol-free bevvies. And, you’ll be less likely to spill the family secrets, make a fool of yourself slurring your Pinot Noirrrrrrr-induced short-stories-long.
You’re safe!
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