WINTER COCKTAILS

Cocktail is the art of mixing alcoholic and non-alcoholic ingredients to make a beautiful drink. Balancing drinks with sweet & sour, bitter, cream and juice is hard. Hence, having a good knowledge and skill about these are important if you want to come up with a fine drink. Think of it as an art, i.e. to make a perfect drink, you need to have knowledge, passion & skill. Let me teach you how to make cocktails that are famous while equally easy to make as it simply requires basic bar and kitchen equipment and alcohol that can be found anywhere.

1) Hot Rum Punch

2) Mulled Wine

3) Sangria

4) Eggnog

1) Hot Rum Punch

● One of the most famous winter drinks in Nepal. Every bar and restaurants sell this drink during the time of winter. It’s also very easy to make it. Let me share the ingredients that is used to make this warm and comforting drink:

• Dark Rum

• Lime juice

• Honey

• Hot water

• Masala ( cinnamon, cardamom, star anise, black cardamom , cloves & nutmeg powder )

2) Mulled Wine

• Mulled wine, sometimes referred to as spiced win, is most often of a red wine variety, infused with various fruits & spices, which happens to be served warm. It was created by the romans in the 2nd century. They would heat wine to fight off the cold against winter. Later the drink became more famous as romans conquered much of Europe

• Let me share with you the ingredients to make this sophisticated drink. You will need:

• Dry red wine

• Brandy

• Fresh oranges

• Cinnamon

• Mulling spices ( cloves & star anise)

• Sweetener (sugar) which can be replaced by honey or maple syrup as per your taste

3) Sangria

• Sangria was invented in Spain & Portugal. Romanians used to drink red wines from Spain when they made wine based punches, i.e. Sangria. Later on, it started getting global acceptance and recognition due to its wonderful composition.

The ingredients needed for sangria are:

• Red wine

• Fruits

• Sweetener

• Orange juice

4) Eggnog

• Eggnog is a holiday cocktail that people usually drink during Christmas. Historically, Eggnogs are also known as milk punch or an egg milk punch when alcoholic beverages are added. Furthermore, it is also rich chilled & sweetened as well.

The ingredients needed for making eggnog are:

• 6 large egg yolks

• ½ cup granulated sugar

• 1 cup heavy whipped cream

• 2 cup milk

• 2 whole cloves

• Pinch cinnamon

• 1 tablespoon freshly grated nutmeg(lightly paced)

• 1 ½ tablespoon vanilla extract

• 60 ml rum or whiskey

• 4 egg whites, optional

With these cocktail recipes you can make cocktails on your own. So what’s the delay? Rush into your kitchen and serve yourself one as well!!

- Asis Maski, LACM