By 
The time of sweaters makes us dream of warming up with a cup of this mulled wine. This recipe by Glühwein, aka German mulled wine, is Day Drinking: 50 cocktails for a mellow buzz by Kat Odell ($ 14), and it’s guaranteed to become your go-to cocktail to keep you entertained during the holiday season. Red wine – eight bottles, to be exact – simmers with sugar, cinnamon sticks, oranges, cloves, allspice, nutmeg, lemons and brandy until it is hot, spicy and sweet. Can you smell it already?
This bulk batch recipe makes about 40 servings, so it’s great for entertaining, but you can easily narrow the recipe down to suit your needs. Check out the full recipe below and get ready to bookmark it immediately.
Remarks
During the winter, and especially when organizing holiday gatherings, mulled wine is my favorite. Not only is mulled spiced wine incredibly simple to prepare – you essentially throw a bunch of ingredients into a pan and cook – the result of the drink always tastes much more complex than the effort involved in making it. Sometimes mulled wine can be a little too sweet: the heat of the drink masks the sugar, but if you don’t finish your cup right away and the wine cools a bit, the sweetness can suddenly overwhelm you. Fortunately, this recipe is the exception. Not too sweet, but just sweet enough, it tastes like a vacation in a glass. Note that this makes enough for a big party, but you can easily cut it down by cutting the recipe in half or even quarter.
Ingredients
- 8 bottles (750 milliliters each) of dry, fruity red wine, such as Pinot Noir or Beaujolais
1 1/4 cup sugar
8 cinnamon sticks
3 oranges sprinkled with cloves, then cut into 1/2-inch-thick slices
30 whole cloves
1/4 teaspoon ground mace
1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
Zest of 2 lemons
2 1/2 cups of brandy, such as Armagnac or Cognac
1 bottle (750 milliliters) of kirsch or maraschino liqueur, for serving
instructions
- Combine wine, sugar, cinnamon sticks, clove-studded orange wheels, cloves, mace, allspice, nutmeg and lemon zest in a 9 quart pot. low heat. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the sugar dissolves and the mixture begins to simmer, 15 minutes.
- Add the brandy and simmer, stirring occasionally, for another 15 minutes. Do not let the mixture boil.
- Strain the mixture through a fine mesh sieve placed over a large heatproof bowl, squeezing the oranges with the back of a spoon to extract the juice; throw it away
solid. Return the Glühwein to the saucepan and keep warm over low heat. To serve, pour 1/2 ounce of kirsch into each cup and top with 1/2 cup of Glühwein.
Source: Excerpt from Day Drinking by Kat Odell (Workman Publishing). Copyright © 2017. Photographs by Nicole Franzen.
Information
- Category
- Drinks, Cocktails
- Food
- North American
- Yield
- About 40 servings
Image source: Nicole Franzen