The Liquid Muse

The (Deceptive) Liquid Muse Breakfast

-or- How A Muse Spends Her Mornings…

One perk of my Musey career is trying cool beverages, and sharing them with you. And, I get a generous pile of new products to try. So, in an attempt to catch up on my liquor reviews, I’m squeezing in several per day. Starting early in the morning.

Now before y’all start planning an intervention, let me assure you that I’m not hitting the hard stuff at 8:00 am. I am, however, reveling in products that make help me be more efficient by allowing me to drink with breakfast, without getting carted off to rehab!

Fre alcohol-removed wine is already available in most places you shop. You may not have noticed it, as it is usually shoved off to the side of the wine aisle – somewhere between the bottled sweet-n-sour and the sparkling cider. And, that is a shame because this product rocks. Unlike many other alcohol-less products I’ve tried, Fre actually tastes good! The bottles are packaged to look like the ‘real thing.’ And the label has style.

Moving on to what really counts, what is inside the bottle is particularly compelling. The White Table Wine is light and crisp. The Chardonnay is so dang delicious, I could sip down a whole bottle in an evening (and wake up without a hangover!). The White Zinfandel is slightly sweeter, of course, but just think what a pretty gift if would make for a very pregnant lady who is sick to death of mineral water and bubbly apple juice. The Red Table Wine goes down very easily, which is fine ‘cuz like I said… no hangover! And, the Merlot has a deeper flavor, which stands up to things like chocolate cake. Not that I would know about that, or anything…

I am particularly impressed with the sparkling Brut. Such a far cry from what I expected. And, the Spumante is slightly sweeter … and goes quite well with peach puree or pomegranate juice, for fancy alcohol-removed “sparkling cocktails.”

In case you aren't already aware of it, I design non-alcoholic cocktails for modern-moms-to-be. Check out a little info on that at The Liquid Muse Preggatinis ™ Blog. Fre alcohol-removed wines don’t position themselves to be served to pregnant women, as there is a tiny bit of alcohol left (something like 1%). So, it is purely my opinion that in the third trimester (when mnay doctors give the "green light" for a tiny bit of regular wine, champagne or beer to pregnant ladies) a glass of Fre could be a welcome relief to a deprived wine-lover.

I have just created a line of alcohol-removed cocktails using Fre, and I’ll be touring the US for two weeks, in December, giving cocktail demonstrations on how to make some fab hangover-free refreshments for the Holiday Season. (more to come on that later…)

In the meantime, keep in mind that while a picture is worth a thousand words, it may in fact be masking a delicious secret…