This holiday punch tastes just like Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s all wrapped up together. It does require you to boil your Christmas tree, but you’ll find it’s no big deal. Read on.
What you need to make 1 cocktail:
1½ oz. gin, or more, to taste
1-1½ oz. spruce-scented syrup
3½ oz. cranberry juice
Ice
2½ oz. tonic
Lime wedge
Fresh cranberries, for garnish
How to do it:
Pour gin, syrup, and juice over ice in a rocks glass, leaving just enough room for the tonic. Add the tonic, and stir gently. Squeeze the lime over the glass and toss the wedge into the drink. Garnish, down it, make a second one, and act like the first one never happened.
Note: Don’t worry about buying a whole bag of cranberries just for garnish; they won’t go to waste. Buy a ton, freeze them, and make something fancrantastic in mid-summer.
Spruce-Scented Simple Syrup
“Spruce-Scented Simple Syrup” is a component of a drink called “Winter Solstice Cocktail,” the recipe for which you can find at one of the blogs I regularly follow, Sippity Sup. It’s delicious. It’s easy to imagine plenty of uses for it: for instance, simply mix it with tonic for a homemade soft drink, or infuse a vanilla cake with it … or, you can do what I did and mix it with gin. I’ve converted Sippity’s measurements to weight and summarized the directions. Visit Sippity to read the original.
What you need:
7 oz. granulated sugar (1 cup)
1 oz. roughly chopped, spruce, pine, or fir (½ cup lightly packed)
4 oz. filtered water (½ cup)
Summarized Directions (For full directions, see Sippity Sup):
Bring to a low boil (4 minutes on med). Stir to dissolve sugar. Return to boil. Cool completely. Steep 8 hours. Strain. Refrigerate up to two weeks.
- Yes, you can eat your Christmas tree. You’d be surprised at the ways.
- Pine has vitamin C!
- You should know that your tree may have been treated with chemicals or even artificial colors before harvest; probably nothing worse than the equivalent of a half-dozen Peeps or a pack of Skittles, but don’t take my word for it. If you happen to live near an uncultivated pine forest, though, good for you, lumberjack!
Holiday Punch
Other Credit for images on this page: Make It Like a Man!
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Yay! I love this. When I make spruce-scented syrup cocktails I tell my guests not to worry if the drink smells like PinseSol! The red color makes this one extra festive. Thanks GREG
When I served this to my guests at Christmas dinner, they were hesitant. I had to assure them that pine trees syrup is indeed edible. Thanks for posting about it!
First of all, I love the word fancrantastic. I plan to use it in my daily lingo now. Thanks for introducing me to that one! Second, I can eat my Christmas tree? Heck yeah! I have to begin the sad dirge that accompanies removing the Christmas tree today. It’s one of my least favorite days of the year. But now I can make that tree last a bit longer…in a drink. Thanks, Jeff! And happy new year to you!
David @ Spiced recently posted…Hoppin’ John
Happy New Year to you, too, David! I’m keeping my Christmas tree until February. Going to turn it into a Valentine tree. I hate to think of you taking yours down.
Spruce scented syrup? That sounds downright amazing! I need to try a cocktail with this next Christmas!
It’s fantastic, and fun to make. I think I’m’n’a make it a Christma tradition.