Mulled Wine

A firm favourite christmas drink has to be mulled wine. Its Infused with the christmasy winter spices and it ensures to keep you warm during this winter period. Today I will sharing my recipe. For me this was the first time I made it and I think it turned out very well. If you do not drink alcohol you can substitute the wine with equal amounts of cranberry and apple juice. Right then, on to the recipe!  

Ingredients :

• One bottle of wine
• 150g brown sugar
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 5 cloves
• 4 cardamon pods
• 2 star anise
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 orange - peel and juice 
• 1 lemon - peel
• 1 lime - peel
• small piece of ginger  

1) In a pan add the sugar, lemon, lime and orange peels along with the orange juice. Warm mixture on a medium heat until the sugar has dissolved.

2) Add the cinnamon stick, cloves, cardamon, star anise and nutmeg, along with quarter of the wine. Also add the ginger but be sure to cut into it so the flavours can be released. Bring this to a boil to form and syrup.

3) Turn down the heat add the remaining wine and bring to a simmer. Do not boil because all the alcohol content will disappear and we don't want that! Simmer for 2 minutes, turn off and cover with a lid. Let it sit for a hour, so everything infuses.

4) After the hour you can sieve the bits out and warm up without boiling and serve!

Hope you guys have a great christmas, be sure to check out all our other christmas posts :)

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Gingerbread biscuits

Hi guys!

I don't know about you but a big part of the christmas festivities includes eating and making food...and drink but I will cover that part next week! To get me into the festive feel of things today (I say today but i've been trying to put bake these and put this tutorial up all week!), I am going to making gingerbread biscuits. These are yummy warm and are the perfect accompaniment to a mug of piping hot chocolate. 

Ingredients Needed:
125g butter
100g dark brown muscovado sugar
4 tbsp golden syrup
325 plain flour plus some for dusting
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
2 tsp ground ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon & cloves
5 tbsp royal icing
2 tbsp water
decorating bits - silver balls

1) In a non stick pan melt the butter, sugar and syrup together. Stir together until combined.

2) In another bowl add all your dry ingredients; flour, bicarbonate of soda, ginger, nutmeg and cloves and stir together until combined.

3) Take the saucepan off the heat (make sure the liquids not boil) and add in the dry ingredients. Stir together until it forms a ball.

4) Let the dough cool down for a few minutes and roll it out onto a floured surface. Using cookie cutters of your choice, cut out shapes and place on baking trays lined with greaseproof paper. Preheat your oven to 170 degrees and cook them for 9 -10 minutes.

5) Once cooked remove from the oven and whilst they are warm, poke a hole at the top in order for you to put a string through them and hang them up.

6) Mix together the water and royal icing and decorate the biscuits however you like.

Tip: Dust the cookie cutters with flour to prevent them form sticking to the dough

I hope you enjoy baking these as much as I did. Do you guys have any christmas food traditions or bake something special during the festive period? I know for me I always enjoy eating loads and loads of panettone (with lots and lots of butter). 

Like always If you don't already follow me on all the social media platforms, get following and I also wanted to add a quick little plug for myself because I have a online store where I sell handmade cards which are designed and produced by me! If you do have the time I would really appreciate if you could check it out,  curlyneedle.bigcartel.com :)

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