The Christmas season is here, which means it's goodbye cold wine of the other eleven months, and hello to 31 days of mulled wine. To celebrate, we've got some lovely do-it-yourself alternative mulled wine recipes for you to make at home.
The MD of D&D event creators, Alexander & Björck, Lena Björck knows a fair bit about entertaining, and what better way to welcome your nearest and dearest this festive season than with a traditional Swedish glögg?
RECIPE FOR LENA’S SWEDISH GLÖGG (serves 10)
Glass: Demitasse coffee cup
Garnish: Raisins and blanched whole almonds (blanch 200g of almonds, once they have cooled mix with raisins and leave in a bowl so guests can add as much as they like to their glögg).
Method
- Remove the seeds from the cardamom pods, and scrape the seeds from the vanilla pod.
- Mix cardamom, vanilla, raisins, bitter almonds and cinnamon sticks in a bowl, add in 100ml cognac, cover with cling film and leave for two days, then sieve out spices.
- Dissolve the sugar in a little boiling water before adding the red wine, the spiced cognac, the additional cognac and the sherry.
- Gently warm and served with the blanched almonds and raisins.
Ingredients
1 bottle of full-bodied Spanish red wine
300ml semi-sweet sherry
350ml cognac
300g caster sugar
225g raisins
6–8 cardamom pods
2 bitter almonds
1 cinnamon stick
1 vanilla pod
The Executive Chef of German Gymnasium, Bjoern Wassmuth, knows how to cook a feast, but also how to create the perfect mulled German wine or Gluhwein..
RECIPE FOR BJOERN WASSMUTH'S MULLED CONVAIR 340 (serves 4)
Method
1. Put all ingredients in a large pan, leave to simmer and infuse on heat. Make sure not to boil the alcohol
2. Once all the sugar is dissolved, take off the heat and place a lid on top and leave to infuse on the side for a minimum of 30 minutes.
3. To serve, warm up the Gluhwein to desired temperature and serve in a cup or heat resistant glass.
Ingredients
1 bottle/750ml red wine (Merlot/Shiraz)
0.5 litre fresh orange juice
150ml dark rum
160ml Grenadine
4 green cardamoms
4 cloves
1.5 cinnamon sticks
1/2 fresh orange, sliced
1/2 fresh lemon, sliced
Juice of 1 lemon
200g sugar