In Winchester there is a bar that isn't all as it seems. Not only are the delicious drinks alcohol free, but the owner is on a mission to transform the future of the food and beverage industry using ideas from the past
You could be forgiven for mistaking Proudfoot & Co for an ordinary – albeit very hip – city centre cocktail lounge. It’s only when you examine the menu that you discover what makes Proudfoot so unusual: not only are the delectable looking drinks on offer all entirely alcohol-free, but they’re also made, almost exclusively, from locally foraged ingredients.
In some places, that might feel faddy, but not here. Because Proudfoot is about much more than just tasty drinks: it’s nothing less than a way to try and fix our broken food system.
‘It all started with food,’ says founder Eoghan Proudfoot. ‘I love it so much that I quit a career in finance to get into it.’ But it wasn’t long before he became disillusioned about the lack of sustainability in the food business, the amount of green washing that went on, and how customers were being short-changed by such an approach. He decided then and there to do something about it, opening Proudfoot & Co two weeks before the first Covid-19 lockdown as a way to road test alternative models.
‘A lot of solutions to this lie in the past, so while most businesses are trying to out-tech our way through the challenges we face with food at the moment, whether it’s climate change, nutrition, sustainability, I’ve gone in the opposite direction,’ Eoghan explains. ‘I’m safeguarding and rebuilding these food systems that used to be pertinent, sustainable, local, nutritious.’
The result is a menu that’s big on foraged herbs, sap tapped from local trees and honey from Eoghan’s own bees. He is constantly experimenting: ‘We’ve done so many prototypes. For every drink that ends up on the menu there’s 100 that don’t work. I just want to prove a concept and show it can be done,’ he says.
He began with drinks at Proudfoot & Co. because it made most sense in terms of squaring his obsession with the provenance of his ingredients with the financial realities of running a hospitality business – foraging is extremely labour-intensive and time-consuming. There are a few snacks available too – from an aged malt loaf made with stoneground flour from a water mill in Winchester, to an English-style membrillo made from local medlar fruit. In time Eoghan hopes that more relationships with local producers will enable him to expand the food menu further. For the moment though he’s happy to keep things small scale rather than go against his values.
Eoghan opted to make Proudfoot alcohol-free out of a desire to ‘create a space that’s a bit more inclusive,’ he says, inspired by travelling in southeast Asia and southern Europe. ‘They have bubble tea shops that are open until 2am. If you go around the Mediterranean people are out until one in the morning, families having a casual drink outside. In the UK after 5pm pretty much everything shuts except the pub and there aren’t alternatives.
‘There’s a big generational divide in that – younger people increasingly, even if they drink (and I drink) are looking for venues that they can relax and hang out in and feel a little bit sophisticated that don’t necessarily involve alcohol.’
Eoghan also relishes the challenge that comes with making complex drinks without the benefit of alcohol as a fixing agent. ‘It forces creativity. For me it’s finding different botanical ingredients, making hydrasols [floral waters]. Ferments come into it as well, using all the techniques you have in your toolbox to create that depth, complexity and flavour that you would get from an alcoholic drink,’ he explains.
Take ‘The Woodsman’, for example, a rich White Russian-style beverage made with a mix of locally foraged tree saps aged in bourbon barrels and blended with roasted chicory root milk and local Jersey milk foam. Or the ‘Roman Tonic’, a slightly bitter aperitif made with foraged roots and seeds including angelica, alexanders and burdock.
While many mainstream non-alcoholic drinks are couched in what Eoghan refers to as “value-minus” terms – he gives the example of ‘nosecco’ and ‘nojitos’ as alcohol-free alternatives to Prosecco and the mojito – Eoghan stresses the “value-added” nature of his drinks.
‘I wanted to take it out of that whole mocktail environment and say, these are just genuinely good. It’s a bit like vegetarianism and veganism over the last few years: instead of it being full of soy protein meat substitutes, people are making genuinely good dishes that happen to be vegetarian or vegan. The same thing is going to happen with alcohol, and I hope to be a trailblazer in that regard.’
Eoghan has certainly chosen a good moment to innovate in the alcohol-free space. Look at recent statistics around alcohol consumption in the UK and you can’t help but notice a trend: the proportion of young people who choose to avoid alcohol has been rising for a while now – as many as 29 per cent of 18-24 year olds according to one recent study by the University of London. Those that do drink booze are starting later than they used to and are drinking less.
We haven’t yet been able to pinpoint quite why this is happening – better understanding of the negative health impacts of drinking alcohol has been mooted, as has a reduction in the stigma associated with teetotalism – but assuming these young people stick to their guns about avoiding alcohol as they get older, this change in outlook is going to have a profound impact on the UK’s relationship with booze. The hospitality sector could be in for a shock.
It’s one that Eoghan is ready for: ‘I’m trying to create something that’s a new category. It’s a bit of a risk, I understand. People like to box businesses into pre-existing categories because they’re recognisable but there’s a real need to create a niche outside that existing framework of alcohol establishments and coffee shops.’
Risks notwithstanding, Eoghan’s experiment is clearly paying off. Between bounce back loan repayments, high energy and labour costs, train strikes and inflationary pressures, it’s not exactly an easy time to be running a hospitality business. But Eoghan is in no doubt that Proudfoot & Co will succeed, he says.
‘I feel especially lucky for the rabidly loyal support from our customers, the amazing response we have had from people that want us to keep doing what we do.’
