Mulled wine?

[TheGreatSloth]

Can you recommend a source of mulled wine, a shop, or a recipe to make it at home? I’ve got one from Lidl which is far too sweet & seems a bit artificial. So purely in the interests of research I thought I should try others.....

My DH is half german and makes his own. He uses this Delia recipe or Nigella Christmas' but without the lemon.

I bought the Schwartz mulled wine packets, used wine I like and followed the instructions on the packet. It was nice. I added rum to one batch and brandy to another batch and they both went down well. If it's too sweet just use less sugar.

Lakeland make an amazing syrup that you just chuck in with a bottle of cheap wine. It's gorgeous!

This Jamie Oliver recipe is great, you can make the syrup up in advance then heat up the wine when you want it... www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/fruit-recipes/jamie-s-mulled-wine/

I cheat and make non alcoholic mulled punch and add brandy for the alcoholics. I get lots of compliments

I swear by the Jamie Oliver method of making a syrup 1st - if you just bung in the ingredients and the wine together the alcohol cooks off before you can get the flavours in.

I do a simplified version of the actual recipe though - satsuma, halved, squeezed and chucked in, 100g sugar per bottle of wine (but I like it relatively sweet) a few slices of fresh ginger, a few cloves, squashed cardamom pods, star anise and a small cinnamon stick (buy the spices from Asian/Specialist shops if you can, much cheaper) Cook with a small splash of wine until you have a thick, reduced syrup, then add in the rest of the bottle (plus a splash of rum/brandy if you fancy), warm through gently and serve.

I’m convinced putting any powdered spice in it makes it go cloudy, blurgh!

This mulled wine syrup, with any red wine and some brandy.
Best we've ever had. Been using it for years.

I use this recipe, works well - although I slightly reduce the amount of sugar
www.allrecipes.com/recipe/20538/gluehwein/

Bottle of cheap red wine
Sliced orange
Half a carton of cheap orange juice or cranberry juice
1 x Star anise
1/2 Cinnamon stick
4/6 x cloves
2/3 tablespoons of sugar - adapt more/less for personal taste
Gently heat in saucepan for 10/15 mins.

Lots of great research material here! I will get started on Monday......