Sangria

Here’s the scenario: It’s a hot summer night, you’ve got friends coming over, and you can’t decide what type of refreshing drink (alcoholic, of course) to serve them. Let me make a suggestion. How about a nice and fruity, but not too sweet, sangria?

I started thinking about sangria a couple of weeks ago when I went out to dinner with my husband, Bob, to celebrate our 21st anniversary. While last year we dined at a four-star hotel outside of Florence, this year we had to settle for Umami Café in Croton-on-Hudson. Alas, no Super Tuscans or Chianti Classicos were in the stars for us, but Bob did order a pitcher of sangria to accompany our meal, and I have to say I really enjoyed it. The combination of red wine with apples, oranges and lemons (plus a healthy dose of sugar, I’m sure) resulted in a quite pleasant, sweet and citrusy taste. “Hmm, this might be something the Inspired Chef needs to learn how to make,” I said to Bob.

The next day Bob mentioned my “sangria quest” to Jeanne, a colleague in his insurance office who loves to cook and entertain. She e-mailed me her favorite sangria recipe, which has a Yellow Tail Shiraz as its base. Doing my due diligence, I cornered my friend Emily Haft Bloom, a cookbook author and food writer, while we were taking a break on the tennis court and convinced her to forward me her recipe for strawberry peach sangria (made with white wine). She also told me about an article she had recently read on Spanish red wine sangria in the Weekend Section of The Wall Street Journal, which I was easily able to track down online.

Which one was the best? There was only one way to find out and that was to host an official sangria tasting. I decided to hold it on the night we were having a going away party for Xin Long, our exchange student from China, who had been with us for the past five months. I figured that all the adults who came by the house could toast our departing student with a glass (well, three glasses) of sangria, and then they could vote for which one they liked best. And yes, I did make a ballot sheet – don’t forget my other hat as the “Obsessive-Compulsive Chef!”

Unfortunately for me, the going away party was scheduled the day after a Bar Mitzvah bash where I had one or two vodka tonics too many. (If there’s any videotape of me dancing like Elaine on Seinfeld, I vow that I will stalk it down and burn it!) So there I was, hung-over in my kitchen at 7:30 on a Sunday morning, preparing not one but three sangria recipes. My kitchen smelled like a distillery, with an array of chopped up fruits – apples, oranges, pears, peaches, lemons, limes, nectarines, blackberries, raspberries and strawberries – soaking in bowls filled with various combinations of tequila, Muscat, Grand Marnier, Cointreau, Spanish brandy, and peach liqueur. The biting scent of alcohol was so strong that you probably could have gotten drunk just by inhaling the vapors.

Miraculously, I managed to make it through the preparation process without getting ill. After sealing the liquor-laced containers and sticking them in the refrigerator, I decided to take a shower before going to the gym, lest anyone smell me and think I had started hitting the bottle early in the morning.

I let my concoctions “brew” all day and just before our guests arrived that evening, I added the various wines, juices, sodas and seltzers to the “drunken fruits” and set the sangrias out on the kitchen counter for the taste test. As our friends arrived, they were each given three Dixie cups (I picked small cups so no one would get smashed) filled with ice and a ballot sheet to vote for their favorite drink.

I’ll report on the results by starting with the second runner up, which was The Wall Street Journal sangria (apparently it offended some people because of its “cinnamony” taste). Jeanne’s came in a close second, and I think it would have had a better chance at winning if I had realized her instructions to “sprinkle the fruit with raw sugar” meant add about a 1/4 cup instead of the scant amount I used. (Once I added some extra sugar, the approval ratings soared). The victor was Emily’s recipe for strawberry peach sangria. Among the voters who marked it number one, comments ranged from “light taste and good, sweet mix” to “delicious” and “yummy, eat with blackened fish.” One person even took the time to write, “The fruity flavor was perfectly mixed with the alcohol to create a flavor similar to a fruit pop.”

Have I sold you yet? If so, let me tell you how I made the winning drink. First, I headed to the liquor store to pick out the alcohol. For the strawberry peach sangria, the store recommended a crisp Spanish white wine with hints of citrus, peach and pear, namely a Martin Codax Albarino from Rias Baixas in Spain. According to the sales associate, Mike, I was promised this wine would make “a real kick-ass sangria.” I also got a peach liqueur called Crème de Peche by G.E. Massenez as well as a bottle of Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise by Paul Jaboulet Aine, which hails from the Rhone Valley. According to http://www.americaswineshop.com/, this pale gold dessert wine has an “exceptionally intense bouquet, with aromas of peach, grape, apricot, mango and lychee.” Have you gotten the peach theme yet?

My next stop was the grocery store, where I picked up the required peaches, orange, lemon and bottle of plain seltzer. I’m happy to report that I was able to buy the strawberries at the local farmers’ market in Pleasantville, as it’s always great to be able to add fresh local fruit whenever possible.

The day before I had the party, I made the strawberry syrup that you need to prepare in advance for this recipe. Don’t let this scare you. It’s easy to make and takes less than 10 minutes. First, I hulled five strawberries and placed them in a saucepan with a little sugar and water. After the liquid started to simmer, I crushed the mixture coarsely with a fork. When it had a dark red, syrupy consistency that looked like jam, I removed it from the heat and let it cool.

The morning of the party, I mixed the strawberry syrup with the white wine, peach liqueur, Muscat, and chopped up strawberries and peaches in a large pitcher. I cut up an orange and a lemon, gently squeezed the thin slices over the pitcher, and then dropped them inside. Right before I served the sangria, I added a couple of cups of the plain seltzer to give it some fizz. Lastly, I filled the serving glasses up with ice to make the drinks nice and cold. Now, that’s the way to serve sangria!

STRAWBERRY PEACH SUMMER SANGRIA
From Emily Haft Bloom

1 750 ml. bottle dry white wine
1 ½ cups Muscat
1 cup peach liqueur
1 ½ cups strawberries, tops removed and sliced
3 firm ripe peaches, pitted and sliced
¼ cup strawberry syrup (see below)
1 large orange, cut crosswise into 4-6 slices
1 large lemon, cut crosswise into 4-6 slices
2 cups plain seltzer water
4 cups ice cubes

Strawberry syrup:
5 large strawberries, hulled and sliced
1 tbsp. granulated sugar
1 tbsp. warm water

Mix white wine, Muscat, peach liqueur, strawberries, peaches, and strawberry syrup in a large pitcher. Gently squeeze citrus slices over pitcher to juice and then drop into pitcher. Chill up to four hours, add seltzer, and serve sangria in tall ice-filled glasses.

Strawberry syrup: Place five hulled strawberries, one tablespoon of sugar, and one tablespoon of warm water in a small saucepan and simmer, crushing strawberries coarsely with a fork. When liquid is syrupy and red in color, remove from heat, allow to cool, and use as above.


JEANNE’S RED WINE SANGRIA
From Jeanne Newman

2 cups fruit (raspberries, blackberries, strawberries, crisp tart apples, pears, peaches, and nectarines are good choices)
1 - 1 ½ cups Tequila
¼ cup Grand Marnier or TripleSec
¼ cup raw sugar
1 quart fresh lemonade
½ quart fresh orange juice
1 bottle Yellow Tail Shiraz
1 cup plain seltzer
1 bag frozen berries

Cut up your favorite fruits into small squares and soak them in Tequila (no need for Patron, but use at least Gold Label Jose Cuervo) and Grand Marnier or TripleSec. Sprinkle the fruit with raw sugar and let it soak in a covered container in the refrigerator for at least an hour, preferably 3+ hours.

For the base of the sangria, add a quart of fresh lemonade, ½ quart of fresh orange juice and a large bottle of Yellow Tail Shiraz, plus a little seltzer for some bubble. Add the marinated fruit (along with the alcohol it’s been soaking in), a bag of frozen berries, and serve over ice.


SANGRIA
(Adapted from Taberna del Alabardero and Josefina Clara Alberti)
From The Wall Street Journal, June 2, 2007, article by Eric Felten

1 bottle Spanish Grenache wine
2 oz. Spanish brandy
2 oz. Cointreau
2 oz. peach liqueur
1 peach, 1 green apple, 1 orange, all peeled and diced
1 pinch ground cinnamon
6 oz. orange juice
4 oz. Sprite or 7UP

Soak the fruit in the liquors for up to a day. When ready to serve, add wine, cinnamon, orange juice and soda. Pour over ice into tumblers.