Having been born and brought up in Europe (Scotland, to be precise), the whole “Christmas in July” thing in Australia has always been, for me at least, a bit odd. That said, it certainly makes more sense to be indulging in some of the more seasonal pleasures when it’s cold and chilly than, for example, chowing down on a full Christmas roast on a balmy 35C day in December. And to be frank, Sydney’s winter, albeit short, can be a little bleak with no festivities to break up the monotony of cold days and long nights.
So when a customer came into the shop yesterday and asked me about mulled wine, I thought, “why not?”. MAD has a great range of herbs and spices, so it was relatively easy to cobble together a collection of sugar and spice (all things nice) from the shop. Add a plump, juicy orange from the Summer Hill Village Fruit Shop and a lovely, very reasonably priced bottle of red from Summer Hill Wine Shop and you’re set to cook up a wee batch of MAD Mulled Wine.
As you may know, I always try all the recipes I put up on here, and this was no exception. (It’s a tough job, but someone has to do it. You’re welcome).
Prep time: 2 minutes.
Cook time: 10-15 mins.
Makes 4 servings.
Ingredients
From MAD Wholefoods;
A MAD Mulled Wine Spice Mix, comprising
5 cloves
1 tsp ground nutmeg
pinch of ground ginger
From the Summer Hill Fruit & Veg shop;
1 orange
From the Summer Hill Wine Shop;
A bottle of red wine (I grabbed a bottle of their very reasonably priced De Bortoli Merlot)
Method
- Slice the orange in half, juice one half and cut the other half into segments.
- In a medium sized saucepan, mix together the orange juice, sugar and spices and heat gently until the sugar has all dissolved to make a syrup (about 2-3 minutes).
- Add the wine and continue to warm gently for 8-10 minutes, being sure not to boil as you’ll cook off all the alcohol!
- Pour through a strainer into individual glasses and garnish with a segment of the orange.
