Summer Imbibing

by Gamliel Kronemer
Special To The Jewish Week

For almost as long as man has been drinking wine, he has been mixing it with other ingredients. The ancient Romans sweetened their wines with honey and herbs, while others in the Mediterranean used water and fruit juices to make their wines more palatable, and, in some cases, potable. Fortunately today, wine is no-longer the coarse, vinegary, brackish substance that it was in the ancient world, and it is no longer necessary to dilute and flavor wine in order to make it enjoyable.

Nevertheless, on a hot and humid New York summer’s day, one of those days when the heat is shimmering off the almost melting asphalt, nothing is quite as refreshing or reinvigorating, as an iced, wine-based mixed drink.

Unfortunately, many Americans look askance at wine-based mixed drinks, too easily associating all of them with the ubiquitous wine cooler of the 1980s—that all too boring mixture of lemon-lime soda with white Zinfandel. Well-crafted wine-based drinks, however, made with fresh fruits and juices, are a different creature altogether, and are well worth the often-minimum effort it takes to prepare them.

For this month’s Fruit of the Vine we have pulled together three easy recipes for wine-based mixed drinks that are just right for summertime sipping.

The Sherry Cobbler:
This refreshing concoction of sherry, sugar and fruit was one of the most popular mixed drinks in Antebellum America. Although rarely made these days, it is a delightful beverage, and worthy of rediscovery.
1/2 cup Tio Pepe Kosher Fino Sherry
2 teaspoons superfine sugar
2 fresh orange slices
Small berries in season (raspberries, blackberries,
boysenberries, and blueberries are all good choices)

Put the sugar, Sherry, one orange slice and about seven or eight berries into a cocktail shaker, with several ice cubes. Shake well, allowing the sugar to dissolve and the ice to break open the berries. Then strain it into a crushed-ice-filled (8-10 ounce) highball glass. Garnish with the second orange slice, and additional berries, and serve with a straw.
An equal refreshing modern variation is the Moscato d’Asti Cobbler. Make as above, except substitute Moscato d’Asti for the Sherry and omit the sugar.

The Kir:
This traditional Burgundian bracer composed of dry white wine and crème de cassis, a blackcurrant liqueur, was once known as the Blanc-Cassis. After World War II it was renamed Kir, in honor of Felix Kir, the war-time resistance hero, who was then Mayor of Dijon. Traditionally, Kir is made with Bourgogne Aligote, but today it is more often made with Chardonnay or Sauvignon Blanc.
5 ounces of Roberto Cohen Bourgogne Aligote or
another dry white wine
1-2 teaspoons Leroux crème de cassis
Club soda or seltzer (optional)
Lemon-twist (optional)

Add the wine to a wine glass and stir in the Crème de Cassis. If desired add in a splash of chub soda, and/or a lemon twist. (Please note: All ingredients should be well chilled in advance.)
To make a sparkling Kir, replace the wine with brut Champagne, Prosecco, Cava, or any dry sparkling white wine, and serve in a champagne flute. This is known as a Kir Royal.

Sangria:
There is no exact recipe for this ever-popular Spanish red-wine-based drink, whose name is derived from the Spanish word for blood. In fact, were one to ask a thousand Spaniards for their recipe for Sangria, in all likelihood one would receive at least 1,500 different recipes. The recipe below is the one we use in the Kronemer household.
1 bottle of young, dry, Spanish red wine (Ramon
Cordova Rioja, Sforno Tempranillo, and de Elvi Ness
are all good choices).
1/3 cup superfine sugar
2 tablespoons brandy
2 tablespoons Leroux orange curacao
1 apple cut up into small chunks
2 lemons, one juiced and one cut into
small wedges
2 oranges, one juiced and one cut into
small wedges
3 cups of ice cold club soda, seltzer,
or sparkling mineral water

Pour sugar and a few tablespoons of warm water into a large glass pitcher and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Add the fruit, the juice, the brandy, the curacao and the wine, stir again, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 3-12 hours. When ready to serve, add the sparkling water, stir well, and pour into ice-filled glasses. Spoon a piece or two of the fruit into each glass as a garnish.

Wine-based mixed drinks can never match the sophistication and subtlety of a good wine. Yet served at the right time, and in the right milieu, a good wine-based mixed drink can be almost irresistible. So the next time the summer heat has you feeling low, perk your day up with an ice-cold wine based drink. You won’t regret it.

A note on wine: When making wine-based mixed drinks, it is not necessary to use expensive wines, but at the same time do not use wines that you would not find palatable on their own. A mixed drink is only as good as its ingredients, and when a bad wine is used as the base of a drink, the final product cannot be very good.

A note on ice: Ice is often one of the most important ingredients in any mixed drink. Always use freshly made ice, as old ice can take on undesired aromas and flavors from other foods in a freezer. If a recipe calls for crushed ice and one does not own an ice crusher, one can quickly crush ice by putting several ice cubes in a heavy-duty zipper-style plastic bag and crushing the ice through the bag with a wooden muddler, kitchen mallet or meat pounder.

Westchester Jewish Conference

Westchester’s Jewish Community Relations Organization