We love hosting holiday parties both big and small for family and friends. Sometimes we will serve one or two festive drinks and passed hors-d’oeuvres before dinner; other, more cozy gatherings, are spent around the fireplace with warm mugs of hot toddies and mulled wine. However you choose to spend the holidays, you cannot go wrong with any of the cocktail recipes we’ve included below. Do you have a favorite cocktail recipe? We’d love to hear about it! Let us know in the comments!
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Mulled Red Wine
Recipe via How Sweet Eats
1 bottle semi-dry red wine, like cabernet
2 cups apple cider
1/3 cup maple syrup
1/3 cup whole cranberries
1 orange, sliced
1 apple, sliced
4 cinnamon sticks
4 star anise
1 vanilla bean, split in half
1 tablespoon whole cardamom pods
1 teaspoon whole cloves
Combine all ingredients together in a saucepan and heat over medium-low heat. Cook for 10 to 15 minutes, until slightly simmering and hot. Serve immediately in glasses filled with cinnamon sticks and orange slices.
Notes: Jessica also includes a great recipe for mulled white wine on her blog, which you can find HERE.
Knockout Bourbon Punch
Recipe and image via The Bitten Word, originally from Adam Bernbach of 2 Birds 1 Stone
8 cinnamon sticks, toasted
1 750ml bottle of bourbon
8 oz. granulated sugar
4 oz. ginger juice (see how they made this here)
4 oz. lemon juice
4 oz. unsweetened cranberry juice
6 oz. Malmsey Madeira (we could not find this and used a port wine instead)
24 oz. sparkling or soda water
Fresh nutmeg
GARNISHES
2 bunches fresh mint
2 12-oz. bags fresh cranberries (we did not use these)
Let cinnamon sticks sit overnight in bourbon. Strain. Stir sugar into the juices until completely dissolved. Pour juice/sugar blend, Madeira, and cinnamon-infused bourbon into a punch bowl and stir. Top with sparkling water and stir again. Grate a healthy amount of nutmeg—about a quarter of the whole—on top.
To serve, pour 3 oz. over ice in a punch cup. Garnish with a cranberry and a sprig of mint. Makes about 75 oz., or 25 servings
Hot Buttered Rum
Recipe via: The Happy Table of Eugene Walter: Southern Spirits in Food and Drink
8 cups apple cider
6 tbsp. fresh lemon juice
15 whole allspice berries
10 whole cloves
2 cinnamon sticks, broken into small bits
5 tsp. dark honey
4 tbsp. unsalted butter
2 cups dark rum
Boil first 6 ingredients about 5 minutes. Remove from heat, add butter, stir till melted, strain into 8 warm mugs, and divide rum among them.
Honey-Cinnamon Apple Cider Sangria
Recipe and image via: Cookie Monster Cooking
1 (750 ml) bottle dry white wine
3 Cups fresh apple cider
1/3 Cup brandy
3 Tablespoons honey cinnamon simple syrup
2 cinnamon sticks
2 to 3 medium apples, chopped
Add the wine, cider, brandy and simple syrup to a large pitcher. Stir to combine. Taste and adjust anything if need be to your own preferences (more simple syrup, more brandy, more cider, etc.). Add in the cinnamon sticks and apples and stir. Place the pitcher in the refrigerator and chill for several hours (we let ours sit overnight!). Yield 4 to 6 servings