As you go deeper into you vegan journey, you’ll start to realise that even in alcoholic drinks they manage to sneak in the odd animal product in there.
If you’s still like to get your drink on, it’ll be good to know which drinks are safe and vegan friendly for the future. Here’s our definitive vegan alcohol list that you can enjoy guilt-free.
Can vegans drink alcohol?
Vegans can drink alcohol, but unfortunately not all alcoholic drinks are vegan. Typically drink brands may sneak in dairy or other animal-based derivatives into alcholic drinks for the sake of colour or preservation.
Beer
There are a good majority of beers that are naturally vegan. I looked into a few from around the world, here are a few you should know of:
Amstel
Beck’s
Carlsberg
Cobra
Coors & Coors Light
Corona
Desperados
Heineken
Sagres
San Miguel
Stella Artois (not the cider)
Tiger
Tsingtao
Non-vegan beers to look out for:
Carling
Fosters
Guiness
Kronenbourg 1964
What do non-vegan beer ingredients include?
Isinglass
Gelatin
Glycerin
Casein
These are typically added as “finings” of sorts to make beer appear clearer for their consumers.
Other brewers with non-vegan beer varieties use gelatine extracted from fish bladders to achieve this same purpose.
Ciders
Ciders are another thing you’d not expect animal products in, considering they tend to be marketed as fruit-based.
That being said, here is the list of vegan-friendly ciders you’re good to buy in the UK:
Aspall
Bulmers
Brother’s
Kopparberg
Old Mout
Old Rosie
Somersby (apple)
Thatchers
Non-vegan friendly ciders to look out for:
Blackthorn
Magners
Somersby (Blackberry, red rhubarb, sparkling rose, sparkling spritz)
Stella Artois cidre
Strongbow original
Woodpecker
What ingredients makes cider not vegan?
Chitin (from crab shells)
Collagen
Gelatin
Isinglass
Commercial cider companies tend to use these additives, such as isinglass for the clarification and refining process. These are more so the larger commercial brands as opposed to the majority.
It’s good to know a lot of ciders are already accidentally vegan!
Wine
From red to wine fruity wines to rose, you’d be pleasantly surprised how many vegan wines are out there, right under your nose.
Here are some common wine brands that are vegan:
Blossom Hill (sparkling zinfandel)
Bogle
Bonny Doon
Catalina Sounds
Chianti
Columbia (h3 range)
Dibon Cava
Kendall Jackson (white wines only)
Giesen
Parducci
San Pedro
Seaglass (Chardonnay)
Stella Rosa (Black, Red, Berry, Rosé, Peach, Pink, Green Apple, Platinum French Vanilla, Moscato, Tropical Mango, Prosecco, Black Lux, Pearl Lux, Pearl Lux Rosé, Orange Moscato, Pineapple, Watermelon, and Ruby Rosé Grapefruit, according to PETA).
To avoid:
Alamos
Brazin
Columbia
Dark Horse
Echo falls
Franzia
Mateus
Seaglass (cabernet, merlot, heritage)
What’s in wine that’s not vegan?
Albumen (egg whites)
Casein (milk protein)
Gelatin (from bovine animals)
Isinglass (extracted from fish bladders)
Strange right? I know it was unexpected for myself when I first found out.
The purpose of these additives are literally for the sake of colouring and a more clear appearance. Now that you know, hopefully you can make better decisions when shopping!
Is liquor (Bourbon, Cognac, Gin, Rum, Vodka & Whiskey) vegan?
Luckily for us herbivores, most hard liquor is vegan. Most of these spirits are distilled using grains or malasses, water and yeast (in the case of whiskey).
Here are some of your favourite brands, suitable for vegans, just for reference:
Absolut
Amarito amaretto
Aperol
Bacardi silver
Beefeater gin (ironically)
Chachaca
Campbell & cooper
Canadian whiskey
Ciroc
Disaronno
Glen’s vodka
Hennessy
Jack Daniel’s
Jagermeister
Kentucky Spirit
Lambrini
Limoncello
Malibu
Smirnoff
Smirnoff ice
Sourz
Tia Maria
WKD
Is vodka vegan?
For the most part, vodka is vegan, being derived from plant-based ingredients, such as fermented grains and sugars. This varies only when specific flavouring agents and additives are snuck into the recipe.
Why are some liquors like whiskey not vegan?
Some whiskey products may contain honey, for instance, such as Jack Daniel’s honey. Some alcoholic drinks may contain other animal products, using Bailey’s as an example, which contains milk.
More often than not for these types of drink, you’d mainly need to look out for either honey, milk or cream.
What alcoholic drinks are not vegan?
We recommend double-checking when it comes to beer and wine, considering they tend to commonly use ingredients that are non-vegan friendly, typically not listed in ingredient lists. These ingredients include: Casein, Chitin, Collagen, Gelatin & Isinglass.
Other alcoholic drinks don’t require these ingredients and are generally vegan; Whiskeys and other liquors (sometimes) may contain dairy in the form of milk or cream, as well as honey.
If you need to confirm any of your favourite drinks have or haven’t made the list, have a look at Barnivore, with an in-depth database of over 40,000 alcoholic drinks and their ingredients.
We hope this post helped you to identify the best alcoholic drinks to go for as a vegan. We hope this helps you make educated decisions in your next night out or shopping run.
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