Making 'scents' of non-alcoholic versions of beer or wine

Around 30% of Australian consumers now buy no-alcohol products, with volumes of no-alcohol beer/cider, wines, spirits and RTDs increasing approximately 60% in 2022, according to IWSR. Beer dominates share of servings across no-alcohol, but wine, spirits and RTDs are growing within the segment.

Despite boasting different flavours, beer and wine also share many aromas, which makes it difficult to produce alcohol-free versions that mimic the real thing. Researchers in ACS’s Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry report on a literature analysis and experiment to characterise the chemical compounds that give beer and wine their unique fragrances. The researchers say their findings could aid the development of flavourful, non-alcoholic substitutes.

Food and beverage researchers are working to recreate the enjoyable aromas and flavours of beer and wine in alcohol-free substitutes. However, because both beer and wine are fermented, they have similar fragrances, and little is known about which scents evoke the unique character of each drink. So, Xingije Wang, Stephanie Frank and Martin Steinhaus set out to identify the key ingredients that distinguish the aroma of beer from that of wine.

First the team conducted a literature review and identified the average proportions of 29 compounds from beer and 32 from wine that make up the drinks’ aromas. The researchers used these proportions like recipes to concoct standard beverages that smelled like either beer or wine. From there, they tweaked these standards, swapping levels of select fragrances in the beer-like beverage to match those in the wine-like beverage, or vice versa, to test which ingredients influenced the perception of each drink. Trained taste-testers smelled each tweaked sample and evaluated it on a scale of beer-like to wine-like.

The researchers report that the taste-testers found that stronger fruity aromas made drinks smell more like wine. The team also swapped the entire profile of scented compounds from one standard into the opposite drink’s base liquid. They discovered that the scented compounds, rather than the base liquid, made the biggest difference in beer- versus wine-like aroma to the testers. The researchers say their results could be used to develop drinks that better mimic beer or wine while meeting consumers’ preferences for non-alcoholic options.

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