The Blondissima: beverages

Showing posts with label beverages. Show all posts

Summer Mocktail Edit

Friday, June 5, 2026

Choosing not to drink alcohol on weeknights shouldn’t mean you're stuck with plain tap water or sad flavored sparkling water. I love saving my alcohol consumption for the weekends, but I still crave the ritual of a weeknight wind-down. There is something so satisfying about the process, shaking up a beautiful blend of flavors and pouring a gorgeous drink into a fancy glass after a long day.

If you are looking to enjoy the complex flavors and elevated experience of a cocktail without the alcohol, you don’t have to settle for less. Mocktails aren't boring. With the right ingredients, you can make them incredibly fun, delicious, and deeply satisfying.

Before we dive into the recipes, let’s talk about building your alcohol-free home bar. Here are the tools, fresh staples, non-alcoholic spirits, and craft syrups I always keep on hand to mix things up.

What to Drink for Dry January

Friday, December 13, 2024

2025 will be my 10th Dry January! I always stock up on Black Friday sales so here is everything I have talked about on my blog and restocked. This year I purchased from Lyre directly from their website to get the sale pricing but they are also sold on amazon. And from De Soi, founded by singer Katy Perry, which is a range of non-alcoholic apéritifs made with natural adaptogens. I'm on my way to NYC today to see the Christmas decorations and take a live peloton class!

6 Canned Mocktails You Need to Try

Saturday, March 11, 2023

Over the last few years I've tried many different alcohol alternatives during Dry January and have created a roundup of my favorites! You can enjoy a drink minus the buzz on weeknights with these delicious drinks. I recommend keeping them on hand to have better options for your dinner guests who don't drink alcohol. I serve these in fun cocktail glasses to make the drink festive. I promise you won't miss the booze with these!

How My Dry January Went

Tuesday, February 7, 2023

Dry January is more and more popular these days! Dry January is good for social drinkers to create new habits. I found a ton of non-alcoholic alternatives to drink last month and want to share my discoveries in this post. Last month I felt I could take booze or leave it, I didn't think about it at all. Turning down alcohol in social settings was empowering, I celebrated both my birthday and company holiday party during this month. Taking a 30-day break from alcohol, such as during Dry January can create a bunch of benefits, including developing a more mindful relationship with alcohol. Even though people say they lose weight by not drinking, I did not. Some people say they get better sleep during Dry January because while alcohol makes you sleepy, it interrupts your sleep cycle so you don't get a good nights sleep and will possibly wake up in the middle of the night. Another benefit is you may feel less anxious and handle stress better. Excessive alcohol consumption causes gut microbiome imbalance and impairs your immune system and ability to recover from illnesses. Alcohol dehydrates your body and skin so abstaining from alcohol may give you clearer and less red skin. Hence it's key to do this for a consecutive 30 days to get the full benefits.

Dry January 2022

Monday, January 31, 2022

This is my 7th year doing Dry January which is a great way to reset for the new year. Skipping alcohol for 30 days is a breeze I find. The research says after one month sober you will have a mood boost and sleep better. You might lose some weight and lose some bloat/redness from your face which will make your skin look brighter. Pausing your alcohol consumption may help you to create a new relationship with alcohol. With so many alcohol free alternative beverages on the market these days, you'll still can have something special to drink at night. Here's a roundup of all the new beverages I tried this month. I drank all of these in a cocktail glass. In past years I used to have to order everything online but my local Foxtrot (they are located in Chicago, DC and Dallas) had everything in store. At the bottom of my post I share some podcasts episodes about Dry January.

Aperol Spritz Mocktail

Friday, October 15, 2021

This year for Sober October I wanted to see if I could find an alcohol free Aperol Spritz that is delicious and I did! Every year I do a sober month or two and this is my 6th year doing it. I feel it helps out not only my body but also my mind. Alcohol consumption is second nature in our culture. People get surprised to hear you're not drinking and start asking all sorts intrusive questions thinking you're an alcoholic when you're not. I think it's good to do 30 day alcohol free challenges every so often. Cutting out alcohol really helps clear the mind and prevents late night munchies.

Alcohol does not help you get better sleep and you wake up more anxious. Even though alcohol makes you fall asleep, it wakes you up a few hours later in the middle of the night. Did you know the longest you can go into deep sleep after drinking alcohol is 5 hours?

I really love a dry month as a reset for my spending and health habits. My mother always says its cheaper to drink at home. lol At this point in my life I'm not looking to cut it out completely forever but I never regret cutting it out of my life for periods of time. I posted more alcohol free beverage reviews in this post.

Pear Martini

Thursday, December 31, 2020

I finally was able to get my hands on a bottle of Kate Hudson's vodka King St. which is gluten-free and uses alkaline water. It's named after King Street in NYC where Kate lived briefly in her 20s. While I rarely eat pears, the flavor of a delicious crisp pear with a splash of elderflower liqueur made the perfect combo! I picked up the generic brand of elderflower liqueur instead of St. Germain and didn't taste a difference so I will be getting the cheap bottle from now on. It adds a bit of sweetness to the drink so I don't have to use simple syrup.

Makes 1 cocktail

Ingredients:

3 oz pear nectar juice
3 oz vodka
3 oz elderflower liquor
squeeze of lemon
dash of bitters

Directions:

Shake all the ingredients together and pour into a chilled martini glass.

Cucumber Martini

Booze-Free Beverage Buys

Wednesday, December 9, 2020

A couple of my friends were doing Sober October so I decided to join in to get my weight loss goals on track. I noticed the market has an increase in alcohol free bottled spirits. I made an honest list here of what is worth trying and what was not to my liking. These booze free beverages have unique complex flavors that go beyond sparkling waters. Perfect if you're looking for something special to drink instead of wine at night. If you're participating in Dry January, save this list!

3 Energy Boosting Drinks that Aren't Coffee

Saturday, September 12, 2020

I'm not a coffee drinker and when I wake up in the morning I'm fine to start my day, but find that I have an energy slump around 3-4pm. Typically it's the bitter black teas that have caffeine while I prefer the fruity herbal teas. So I had a hard time finding caffeinated teas that I like. Then I tried these green fuels and found they they did the trick to wake me up!

Dry June: Alcohol-Free for 30 Days

Monday, July 13, 2020

For about the past five years I have been doing a Dry January, which is a month without alcohol. Dry January is super popular in Great Britain as is Sober October and Dry July is a thing in Australia. This year I didn't do it in January because I went to Mexico so I did it in June instead. It was fairly easy, I like to do this once a year as it gives me that "oil change" I need to reboot. Now I'm back to only drinking on the weekends. The reason I did it was to reboot my health goals on June 1 to help jump start my weight loss. I've been exercising consistently throughout quarantine, but have been eating a lot too. And when I drink, I get hungrier.

Cucumber Martini

Sunday, April 19, 2020

I love the fresh flavor of cucumber water that you get in hotel lobbies. When I heard that restaurants are now allowed to deliver alcoholic cocktails I thought what would love to drink? The cucumber cosmo at Fig and Olive but the restaurant is closed right now. I absolutely love cucumber cocktails and I figured this is something I could make myself. At the bar this cocktail would be $16 plus tip. I spent $70 on the two full size bottles of St. Germain and Effen Vodka. If you do the math, 4 cocktails would equal $70 at the bar. I made 3 drinks and used less than a fourth of the bottles.

Kombucha

Wednesday, August 22, 2018

Have you heard of Kombucha? It's fermented beverage made from black tea and sugar that becomes a probiotic. It’s been consumed in China for over 2000 years. It supports a healthy gut even if you don’t have stomach issues. It boosts your immune system with antioxidants and gives you energy.

It tastes fizzy, sour and sweet, it’s like a healthy soda. The beneficial bacteria help with nutrient absorption, digestion, and aids the detox process. Kombucha helps with energy production, cell regeneration, stabilizes blood sugar, and replenishes good bacteria in your stomach.

Black Cherry Soda Roundup

Wednesday, March 2, 2016

While doing my #30 day detox from alcohol, I was on a search for a more natural, flavored replacement beverage. Being on a mission to lose weight I wanted to find alternative beverages to drink that are packed with flavor and not sugar. As a kid I never liked sparkling water and rarely drank soda but now I appreciate the carbonation as an alternative beverage. Here's my sparkling bubbles roundup of black cherry flavored drinks. Many are sweetened with stevia which I've discussed in this post about artificial sugar.

Deer Park Sparkling Black Cherry
It's a little bland because there's no added sugar, but it has crisp carbonation and a hint of cherry flavor. It's reasonably priced at $3 for a 6 pack of 16.9oz bottles.

Bai Bubbles is a sweetened water beverage with only 5 calories. It has a dark red color from cherry juice concentrate and has a nice cherry taste with bubbles, but the after taste is a bit sour. The sweeteners used are erythritol and stevia. It contains juice from coffee cherries, the fruit around the coffee beans and is filled with antioxidants. Also it has a little caffeine in it, about the same as green tea. Their website lists cocktail recipes you can make with their drinks, I tried one last year. This was the most expensive to buy at $2.50 a can.

Zevia turned out to my favorite in this taste test. It's a clear color and very sweet with strong carbonation. It has a nice cherry flavor and even smelled of it while containing no calories. It's sweetened with stevia and monk fruit. You can find concktail recipes on their website including this skinny margarita. They have a whole line of products I'm looking forward to trying their other flavors including Ginger Root Beer, Mountain Zevia, Dr. Zevia, Grapefruit Citrus, and Cherry Cola.

Honest Fizz tasted a little flat to me, and the color was an ugly light brown from the added carmel coloring. This was my least favorite for flavor quality.

Izze Sparkling So technically this is blackberry but the flavor is close enough. The bottle has a label on it that says "no added sugar", but I didn't realize this had 130 calories in it and 29g of sugar! But it comes from the natural fruit juices they use, not added white sugar.

For more suggestions on what to drink besides soda check out this post.

Raspberry Pear Mocktail

Friday, March 13, 2015

I've seen the Bai bottles everywhere at Safeway, CVS, Walgreens and Whole Foods but I never thought to try it until I saw this blog post. The bottle has only 5 calories and the ingredients of the Congo Pear flavor are:

Filtered water, Bai® Natural Sweetener Blend™ (erythritol, organic stevia extract), pear juice concentrate, natural flavors, citric acid, organic coffeefruit, white tea extract.

I've always avoided splenda in my yogurt or anything I eat because I think its a poisonous artificial sweetener so I was excited to see Bai uses erythritol and stevia to sweeten their product. Here's the super simple recipe to make yourself a delicious sparkling drink!

Ingredients:
1 ½ cups of sparkling water
½ bottle of Bai’s Congo Pear
5 raspberries, smashed
Chia seeds/hemp seeds/flaxseeds
Lemon, squeezed
Ice

Directions:
Add sparkling water over ice. Then add the Congo Pear. Muddle 5-10 raspberries with your choice of seeds. Mix into sparkling pear concoction and then squeeze lemon on top.

Summer Mocktails Get Thirsty...

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

So it's hot outside but you want a healthy alternative to your favorite frozen alcoholic drink? All you need is a blender to enjoy this icy concoction of sweet honeydew and mint smoothie. It's fresh, light, and low cal! Plus did you know that mint leaves help stimulate the digestion of fat!

What to drink besides water?

Monday, March 11, 2013

I'm sure you've read all about the dangers of soda and how harmful high fructose corn syrup and artificial sweeteners are to you. So I wanted to suggest some drinks other than water that you can consume.

My favorite tea is Tazo Passion, you can get it at Starbucks, Whole Foods or Safeway. It's described as "an exuberant herbal infusion of hibiscus, cinnamon & tropical fruits." It's a sweet red tea. I love this tea hot or cold. In fact I've found that you can make 2 cups out of one tea bag, so I'm saving some money there. I boil water, pour it into 2 cups, then rotate the tea bag between each cup and add a drop of liquid stevia (for added flavor I squeeze a lemon slice in). Then I put both cups in the fridge, and the next day I have iced tea! I will also mix this into my shakeology.

I don't drink regular Crystal Light because it contains aspartame, one of the most dangerous artificial sweeteners. I do drink their new Pure version in the summertime when I have a craving for lemonade.
I buy the Trader Joe's label called fast flavor sticks lemonade but I gather they are the same product. One packet is 2 servings but makes a tall glass of 30 calories with no sugar.