Almost Zero Wonderful White

I was hoping that one of my best bets will be turning to a seasoned winemaker like the South African Van Loveren and seeing what they have to offer in the dealcoholized realm. In the end, their red wasn’t bad but didn’t wow me by any means. But white wine has always seemed more primed for dealcoholization to me. So let’s turn to that side of the spectrum and see what the non-alcoholic branch of Van Loverene has in store through this Almost Zero Wonderful White review. Keep reading to find out if it is worth your time.

Almost Zero Wonderful White Review

While it is ultimately not the most important thing, I am a bit turned off by the packaging of Almost Zero wines. My first and most basic problem is the brand name. While it is technically accurate, calling this branch Almost Zero makes it sound more like a reduced alcohol wine rather than a legally dealcoholized one. Someone looking for wine sans the booze could see that name and brush past thinking it’s not for them.

They also go a bit far in pumping the health benefits, in my opinion. The bottle comes with a cardboard neck cover comparing the nutritional content to traditional wine and even orange juice. At first glance, it appears this wine has an abnormally high calorie count for a dealcoholized version, at 114 per serving. But then you notice that South African serving sizes are 12 ounces compared to the usual 5 we find in the United States. This means the calorie count is actually quite low.

This wine comes with a green color theme on the label, and a hint of that shade can also be found in the body of the wine itself. There are no bubbles to speak of on the pour. Once out of the bottle, the liquid appears to be more of a sharp translucent gold, so perhaps the light twinge of green comes from the packaging itself.

The biggest element that I find on the nose and seems to be very common in these types of wine is green apple. It isn’t terribly strong and is accented by some dustines and hint of natural gas. The wine definitely doesn’t strike my nose as dry, but there is a nice lack of overpowering sweetness.

These areas of evaluation are important in the world of wine, but when we are discussion the dealcoholized, flavor is all that really matters. So it’s time to dig in and answer the question, “Is Almost Zero Wonderful White good?” 

Is Almost Zero Wonderful White Good?

I have a mixed reaction upon my initial tasting experience with this wine. There is a lot of grape juice quality present, which is the last thing that I am looking for, but when I give it a brief second, a number of other elements begin to present themselves. This will keep this sampling from being a complete flop.

The tongue follows the nose fairly accurately. I would say that the green apple character is even more dominant upon tasting than it was in the aroma. That kind of dusty aged quality that I detected on the nose does disappear. There aren’t a ton of other flavor elements that step forward. But the apple alone takes the front seat from the grape without being overwhelmingly tart.

I think this wine falls very clearly into the semi-sweet classification. As on the nose, there is no hint of dryness, but it stops well short of being syrupy or overly sweet. This is a bigger deal than it should be, because oftentimes when the alcohol is removed sugar can take on a larger role, particularly in a white wine. Here everything is balanced fairly well. There is a pleasant amount of sweetness followed by a bit of that tart apple on the back end of the tasting.

The mouthfeel is extremely soft on the palette. It goes down easy, as it should, and does not linger on the tongue longer than it is welcome. The tasting is actually quite clean and crisp throughout but truly pleases me on the finish, wiping itself bare and preparing me for the next sip.

The little things might be enough to help this wine stand out just a tad from its counterparts on the market. Finish reading to find out what that means for my Almost Zero Wonderful White rating. 

Almost Zero Wonderful White Rating

Although I have yet to come across a dealcoholized wine that really knocks my socks off, I have also yet to come across one that doesn’t taste good. That’s what makes distinguishing the quality levels of these types of beverages difficult. Grape juice is good. So even the ones that struggles to establish themselves as wine are far from offensive. If you have legitimate reasons for wanting to needing to sip a wine sans alcohol, maybe you don’t need it to remind you of a high-quality traditional wine. Even I, as a reviewer have moved past that pipe dream as of now.

But parsing out these minor quality differences is my job. And this wine faired decently well. It has all of that refreshment and drinkability of grape juice but does well enough in terms of mouthfeel and texture to make me feel like I’m drinking a run-of-the-mill alcoholic white wine. That might not sound laudatory, but it is enough for me to wrap up this Almost Zero Wonderful White review by bumping it up to a score of 4 out of 5 stars. You could definitely do worse.

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