Nothing says ‘Christmas’ quite like a piping hot glass of mulled wine. Here at The Wild Boar, we have our own version of this festive classic – it’s really simple, takes next to no time to prepare and, most importantly, tastes delicious!
The Wild Boar Mulled Wine
Ingredients:
- 2 Bottles of Red wine (a young Merlot is ideal)
- 1 litre cloudy apple juice
- 110 g caster sugar
- I long cinnamon stick
- 2 star anise
- 4 cloves
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 orange
- 1 lemon
- Balvenie 12 Year Old DoubleWood
Method:
- Pour the wine and the apple juice into a saucepan with the sugar and spices.
- Add large pieces of orange and lemon peel (peel the whole fruit)
- Gently heat whilst stirring until the sugar has dissolved and then continue to heat for a further 15 minutes. Be sure that you don’t allow the liquid to boil as the alcohol will evaporate – and we don’t want that, do we?
- Take off the heat and leave for all the flavours to infuse for ½ hour.
To serve:
Add a couple of glugs of Balvenie DoubleWood to taste, reheat and serve!
This particular Balvenie is one of our favourites. It is aged in ex-bourbon casks before being finished in sherry casks, imparting notes of spice, vanilla and cinnamon. Our ‘Master of Malt’ George describes it as being similar to Christmas Pudding!
Top tips:
Tie your whole spices in a muslin in order to save scooping out bits before serving and, for that extra taste of Christmas, why not add clementine and mandarin peel, ¼ grated nutmeg, vanilla pod (halved), ginger or cardamom?
Be careful not to over spice the wine though – less is always more!