Is there vegan alcohol?

In this brief guide, we will answer the query, “Is it vegan alcohol?” and will discuss a complete guide for vegan alcohols.

Is there vegan alcohol?

Yes, there is vegan alcohol. A website Barnivore consists of a list of all the vegan alcohols available on market from different breweries.

Comprehensive guide to vegan beers

Water, a grain like barley or wheat, yeast, and hops—a flower that gives beer its unique, bitter taste—are the four major components in beer. To make alcohol, the yeast ferments and digests the sugar in the grain

There are no animal products in this dish. Nevertheless, some brewers use non-vegan substances to enhance the clarity, taste, or color of their beers in some way. 

Solid-liquid separation processes (finings solution, adsorption, filtration or centrifugation) are used in haze active beverages to remove these particles. One of the techniques used for this process is by adding isinglass finings, which are derived from the swim bladders of certain tropical and sub-tropical fish. The largest component of isinglass is collagen, which carries a net positive charge when it is dispersed in beer. The side chains attract the negatively charged yeast cells and the whole complex precipitates and can be removed from the beer. However, most beers are vegan (1).

During the brewing process, vegan beers do not utilize any animal or insect components. The majority of commercial beers produced by well-known brewers are cruelty-free. These are some examples:

·         Budweiser and Bud Light

·         Coors and Coors Light

·         Corona Extra and Corona Light

·         Michelob Ultra

·         Miller Genuine Draft and Miller High Life

·         Heineken

·         Pabst Blue Ribbon

·         Guinness Draught and Guinness Original XX

Remember that this is not a complete list; there are many more vegan beers on the market. Craft brewers may declare their product’s vegan status through language or a vegan trademark on the label. Alternation Brewing Company, Little Machine, and Modern Times Brewery are three vegan microbreweries. Make sure to inquire about the vegan status of your favorite craft brewery’s brews.

Comprehensive guide to vegan wine

Grapes are crushed and fermented to produce alcohol in winemaking. It is possible to add fining agents at this point in the fermentation process to eliminate undesirable components like tannins, which are bitter plant chemicals. The wine cannot be called vegan if animal-based fining agents are employed.

Clarification of wines with fining agents consists of adding an exogenous substance in a turbid wine that drags down other suspended particles by flocculation or adsorption. The main benefits rely on increasing the wine limpidity, color stability and modulating mouthfeel perception by reducing some phenolic compounds of aggressive taste sensations. Among clarifying substances, the protein fining agents because they have good ability to interact with wine phenolic). Traditional animal-derived fining agents are milk, gelatin and egg proteins. However, the use of plant-derived macromolecules such as proteins, cell wall material, or fiber from different vegetal sources have been recently proposed as alternative solutions for the clarification wines (2).

Many vegan wines are available for purchase. Some vegan wines include clay-based fining agents like bentonite or proteins obtained from wheat and other crops. Vegan wine is available from a variety of manufacturers, including:

·         Bellissima Prosecco

·         Cycles Gladiator

·         Frey Vineyards

·         Lumos Wines

·         Red Truck Wines

·         The Vegan Vine

Additionally, a vegan trademark or statement indicating the winery’s vegan status may be seen on many labels. Make sure to keep in mind that some vineyards make both vegan and non-vegan wines. There are several vegan red wine brands, such as Yellow Tail and Charles Shaw, however, their white wines are not.

Comprehensive guide vegan spirits

Spirits, as opposed to beer and wine, get their alcohol concentration from fermenting substances via a process known as distillation. Non-flavored alcohol is often vegan. Some flavored liquors and a few cocktail recipes, on the other hand, are not alcohol-free.

Whiskeys and bourbons Vegan booze may be found easily. The following distilled spirits, in their unflavored form, are typically devoid of animal-derived components, even during production.

·         Brandy

·         Gin

·         Tequila

·         rum

·         vodka

·         whiskey

There are, however, exceptions to every rule. Whether a spirit is vegan or not is a matter of personal preference.

Tips for finding vegan alcohol

The demand for vegan-labeled products is on the rise, especially in Western countries. Consequently, the availability and sales of vegan-labeled products increased substantially. In the United States, the plant-based food market was totaling $7 billion and has grown twice as fast as the animal-based food market in 2020. For this reason, vegan labeling is becoming increasingly attractive for food marketers as a mere communication tool. Whether a product is vegan often cannot be clearly determined from the list of ingredients, as in the case of wine, which is often clarified with gelatin to remove the cloudiness. This gelatin is an animal-based product but is not included in the list of ingredients since it is subsequently filtered out. However, its involvement in the production process may contradict individuals’ ideas of vegan food. Consumers who are explicitly looking for vegan products may want to avoid foods that use animal-based production aids and additives. Appropriate labeling can therefore provide important and easily accessible information for consumers following a respective diet. However, the labeling of vegan wine is not required in the United States (3).

Finding vegan booze isn’t always easy. In the United States and Europe, it is not required for most alcoholic drinks to declare their contents, but some firms do so voluntarily. Fining agents are, nevertheless, an uncommon occurrence on company websites. If substances like isinglass and gelatin have been utilized during processing, they seldom appear on labels.

There are a few ways to tell whether an alcoholic beverage is vegan

·         Inquire with the product’s creator. The best way to find out whether an alcoholic beverage is vegan is to inquire directly with the maker. Contact information is frequently available on a company’s website.

·         You might look for vegan symbols. Vegan symbols or language may be used on the label of certain products to signify their vegan status.

·         Look out for remarks about food allergies. Some alcoholic drinks include milk, eggs, fish, and shellfish, all of which are frequent allergies for many people. The United States does not require companies to identify the most common allergies on their packaging.

·         Carmine’s statements are easy to spot. There is a law in the United States requiring manufacturers to mention carmine. See whether the label says anything about the presence of carmine or cochineal extract.

·         Find vegan resources on the internet. Barnivore, which records the vegan status of more than 47,000 alcoholic drinks, is a good resource.

·         As a rule of thumb, steer clear of alcoholic beverages that do not claim to be vegan on the label.

There are several alcoholic drinks that are vegan by design. While some use animal products as components or in the preparation of their goods, this is not universal.

The presence of honey and lactose are two examples of non-vegan ingredients that are readily apparent in certain beers. As a filtering or clarifying agent, many others may be hidden from view since their names do not betray their presence.

When it comes to ingredients, producers are not required to disclose them. Because of this, you should check the product’s label for a vegan symbol or get in touch with the maker if you’re still not sure.

Conclusion

In this brief guide, we answered the query, “Is it vegan alcohol?” and discussed a complete guide for vegan alcohols.

References

1. Walker, Samantha L., M. Carmen Donet Camarena, and Gary Freeman. Alternatives to isinglass for beer clarification. J Inst Brew, 2007, 113, 347-354. 
2. Gordillo, Belén, et al. Impact of alternative protein fining agents on the phenolic composition and color of Syrah red wines from warm climate. Food Chem, 2021, 342, 128297.
3. Gesa, Stremmel, et al. Vegan labeling for what is already vegan: Product perceptions and consumption intentions. Appetite, 2022, 106048.