Mulled Grape Juice

Mulled wine is something I love and will make or buy over the winter months but, after buying a bottle of non alcoholic gluwein from a well known furniture store, it made me wonder, is it actually better?

I seem to say this a lot but I'm not puritanical.  I will happily have a glass of wine but I'm of the view where if you can make small changes to your life without even noticing which help your health, perhaps you should.

When I've made mulled wine in the past, I've added masses of sugar to get the same kind of flavour you can get when buying it in a Christmas Fair, now I'm more than a little convinced that I may have been drinking mulled grape juice all along (or at least a proportion of it.)  Still, older and wiser now, I can now make my own and this is how to do it.

Mulled Grape Juice - makes enough for 1, easily doubled or more.

Ingredients

250ml, half a pint of Red grape juice
6 peppercorns
1 green cardamom, split open and put in seeds, pod and all
4 coriander seeds
1/2 tsp ground (powdered) cinnamon
Half a lemon

Method

Heat the grape juice with the spices in a saucepan until bubbling.  Take off the heat and allow to infuse for a couple of minutes.  Add a squeeze of lemon juice and strain into a heatproof glass (a tea-strainer works well for this).

Enjoy!

If you want to or have more cash, cinnamon sticks would be great for this as some of the ground cinnamon does make it through the sieve (just don't drink the last drops if you're using ground cinnamon) but using a stick would make it much more expensive.

I was inspired to make this by two challenges currently going ahead on two different blogs about sugar and spice in Lavender and Lovage and Pepper for The Spice Trail from Bangers and Mash.  

Pepper might seem unusual in a sweet drink but it's often included in drinks and sweet Christmas dishes in central Europe.  It lends a subtle heat but also flavour.

I've also linked up to the Credit Crunch Munch hosted this month by My Little Italian Kitchen but run by Fuss Free Flavours and Fab Food For All.

I've linked as well to Bangers and Mash Festive Family Foodies link up about festive recipes.

And because this post is so darn seasonal and great as well as healthy, “This post is shared at the Special Holiday Edition: Healthy, Happy, Green & Natural Party Hop”.