Michele StuevenWelcome to Sober October. According to certified Nutritionist and Certified Functional Food Professional Amy Fox, sober curiosity means becoming more aware of your drinking and developing a healthier relationship with alcohol. For many people, completely abstaining from drinking is not the goal — instead, it’s about finding ways to make drinking “small and irrelevant in your life.”
Fox says it’s about giving your mind and body a chance to experience the health benefits of abstinence, which include better sleep, healthier skin, improved emotional wellness, including reduced symptoms of anxiety and depression, reduced risk of cancer and cardiovascular disease, weight loss, clearer skin, improved immunity function, and better brain function and memory.
Her tips on how to help get started?
Be aware of how you feel during and after you drink. Do you feel low-energy, sluggish or brain-fogged, or anxious and easily triggered? These are signs you could benefit from taking a break.
Get curious. Ever wonder how you might feel if you drink less? Sober October is a great time to find out.
Have a strategy: This includes planning healthy alternatives to alcohol, such as energy-boosting mocktails and stocking up on the ingredients to make them.
With the explosion of the mocktail trend in restaurants, bars and at home, it’s making it easier and easier for the curious to explore sobriety. Here are some ideas of how to raise a tasty glass to Sober October.
Courtesy Food and Mood Lab
The Sunnyside online app for mindful drinking has launched a Sober October campaign, aimed at promoting a healthier lifestyle and raising awareness about the benefits of alcohol-free living. The goal of the challenge is to encourage individuals to abstain from alcohol consumption for the entire month of October, fostering improved health, personal growth, and the opportunity to raise awareness and funds for charitable causes, all while creating a sense of community among participants. The campaign includes a range of resources and strategies, tapping into everything from drinking alone and avoiding anxiety to weight loss and binge drinking.
Stephanie Essie Evans’ newly opened Shirley’s Temple in Signal Hill is the first and only mocktail bar in Long Beach. The vintage deli offers gourmet sandwiches, flatbreads and salads in a 1940s-themed old Hollywood vibe featuring vinyl on the record player. Intriguing zero alcohol libations at the Black-owned bar include the Vintage Violet, with lemonade, violet, coconut and butterfly pea foam, as well as the Eartha Spritz, an ode to 1950’s singer Earth Kitt, which is a blend of green tea, lemongrass, ginger, and the nonalcoholic spirit Aplos with Sarawak black pepper. The beauty of all the mocktails on the menu is that they are half the price of their cocktail counterparts elsewhere. There’s a ladies-only Girls and Games night that takes place on Thursday, Oct. 12, hosted by Ladies of Long Beach with a happy hour all night long featuring $3 off mocktails and $10 flatbreads on the menu.
Courtesy The New Bar in Venice
The New Bar, Venice’s first nonalcoholic bottle shop, will host a tasting of Tilden’s award-winning ready-to-serve mocktails on Sunday, Oct. 8. On Thursday, Oct. 12 there will be a meet-the-maker happy hour with the Three Spirit founder of plant-based, adaptogen-packed spirits and wine alternatives celebrating what you put into a drink, rather than what you take out. They’ve also got an in-store and online product spotlight:
The New Bar Bundle, $85 (was $105)
Everything But The Cart, $275 (was $350)
Everything you need for a bar cart makeover, because new habits are easier to build when they’re delicious. The kit contains Prima Pavé sparkling Blanc de Blancs, Giesen Sauvignon Blanc, Ghia aperitif, Noughty Syrah, Spiritless’ Jalisco 55 Tequila, Monday Gin, Lili’s Ruby sparkling wine alternative, Spiritless’ Kentucky 74 Bourbon as well as ready-to-drink cocktails, beers, and mixers from Lyre’s, De Soi, Athletic Brewing, Visitor, Mikkeller, Avec and a nonalcoholic bitter trio from All The Bitter.
If you’re the designated driver out with drinking buddies or just sober curious, the new old-school-style Bar Next Door on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood welcomes teetotalers, offering a diverse list of nonalcoholic choices including Ritual gin, rum, tequila, and whiskey alternatives, as well as Lyre’s Italian Spritz and beer. It also offers Martini and Rossi Vibrante and Floreale, as well as Seedlip and Memento Green spirits.
FRE Alcohol-Removed Wines recently launched a new Sauvignon Blanc, as well as single-serve mini nonalcoholic Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon. Here are some of its spooky mocktail recipes for Sober October, including a Freaky Margarita Mocktail, an Apple Pie Sangria, and a Smokey Oakey Mocktail.
The Freaky Margarita (Courtesy FRE)
Advertising disclosure: We may receive compensation for some of the links in our stories. Thank you for supporting LA Weekly and our advertisers.