Mulled Wine: A Glass of Seasonal Cheer
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Although it’s associated with the holiday season, mulled wine will warm you up whenever it’s cold outside. Learn how to whip up a tasty batch at home without muss or fuss.
Sipping mulled wine seemed exotic when we first encountered the hot spiced concoction at Christmas markets as far way as Helsinki and Hamburg and as close as Philadelphia. For years, we were excited to order warming cups of glühwein when we traveled during the holiday season but, until recently, we never thought about making mulled wine at home. We assumed that the recipe would be complicated. Plus, we didn’t want to spoil the experience of sipping mulled wine during our travels.
Color us surprised to discover that making mulled wine at home is super easy to do. All it takes is red wine, brandy and a handful of pantry ingredients. Homemade mulled wine has brought our Christmas market experiences straight to our home kitchen and our house smells divine every time we whip up a batch.
What Is Mulled Wine?
Mulled wine is essentially wine that’s flavored with mulling spices and heated until it’s warm. Most modern mulled wine recipes add a sweetener like honey or maple syrup and a bonus liquor like brandy or port to the mix. The end result is a hot spiced wine drink that warms both the body and soul from the inside out.
Fun Fact
Typical mulling spices include cinnamon, cloves, peppercorn and star anise (all used in this recipe) as well as allspice, cardamom and nutmeg.
History of Mulled Wine
Although mulled wine is ridiculously popular at Christmas markets in Germany, France and Scandinavia, none of those countries get credit for inventing mulled wine. Credit for mulled wine, along with plumbing and the aqueduct, goes to the Romans.
As history reveals, the Romans didn’t call the drink mulled wine when they first added spices to heated wine. Instead, they called it conditum paradoxum. And they didn’t just drink the tasty tipple. They shared it with the world or at least the countries that they conquered.
Ingredients
Despite mulled wine’s complex flavors, you don’t need a lot of exotic items to make it at home. Our easy recipe requires the following ingredients:
Ingredient quantities are detailed in the printable recipe card below.
How to Make Mulled Wine
Making mulled wine at home is easy to do whether you’re entertaining or simply have a hankering for spiced hot wine. The hardest part is gathering the ingredients.
In this recipe, the first step is to pour a bottle of red wine and a quarter cup each of brandy and maple syrup into a medium saucepan.
Add mulling spices and a sliced orange to the pot.
Mix the ingredients and bring the mixture to a simmer. Continue simmering for at least 20 minutes and up to a few hours.
Pro Tip
While you don’t have to continuously stir while the mixture simmers, keep an eye on the pot to ensure that it doesn’t boil.
Strain out the mulling spices. You can do this all at once or you can strain the mixture directly into each glass mug using a small mesh strainer.
Garnish with extra ingredients that you have on hand. We like to garnish our mulled wine with a cinnamon stick, an orange slice and a star anise pod.
Variations
The beautiful thing about mulled wine is that you can make it any way that you want. We recommend trying our recipe before you make any or all of the following variations:
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Mulled Wine Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 bottle red wine
- 1/4 cup brandy
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
- 1 orange (sliced)
- 4 cinnamon sticks
- 6 cloves (whole)
- 2 pods star anise
- 6 pink peppercorns (or 4 black peppercorns)
Equipment
Instructions
- Pour red wine, brandy and maple syrup into a medium sauce pan.
- Add mulling spices (cinnamon sticks, cloves, peppercorns and star anise) and orange slices. Gently stir.
- Simmer on low heat for at least 20 minutes. Do NOT bring to a boil.
- Strain out spices and serve hot mulled wine in heat-resistant glass mugs.
Nutrition
💡 Frequently Asked Questions
Mulled wine is a red wine drink that’s flavored with mulling spices and served hot. Typical mulling spices include allspice, cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, peppercorn and star anise.
Romans get credit for the practice of heating spiced wine to create mulled wine. Centuries ago, they spread the concept of mulled wine, or conditum paradoxum as they called it, to countries that they visited and/or conquered.
Red Wine, Brandy, Maple Syrup or Honey, Orange and Mulling Spices
Glög, glühwein, vin chaud, vinho quente and vino caliente are alternate names for mulled wines.
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