While I definitely do not consider myself a wine expert, I do have a few tricks up my sleeve. One of my all-time favorites is using frozen grapes in the place of ice cubes, because ridding the world of watered-down wine is a personal goal of mine.
Of course, it doesn’t hurt that the grapes soak up some of the wine and become a little boozy and delicious. And yes, soaking grapes in wine and enjoying them as a snack is a brilliant idea — one that I am now kicking myself for not realizing sooner!
Blogger Julie Blanner did figure this out, however, and she recommends rolling the soaked grapes in sugar! She originally featured a recipe using red wine and red grapes.
But with New Year’s quickly approaching, you can also make the recipe seasonally appropriate by using champagne and green grapes. All you have to do is soak green grapes in champagne or Prosecco, roll them in sugar, and then throw them in the freezer. You can find the entire recipe on her blog, but just make sure you don’t try to whip these up at that last minute — you’ll need at least 12 hours of soaking and two hours of freezing.
If you’re going the red grape route instead, the flavor you’ll get depends on the wine you choose. You can, of course, just use your favorite red wine.But if you want a sweet flavor to go with all that sugar, select a sweet red wine or Port (which is typically a dessert wine).
Don’t like grapes? Don’t worry — the recipe works for strawberries, too! You only have to soak the strawberries for about an hour, so they are quicker to make if you’re in a hurry. The recipe suggests using rosé in place of red wine or champagne, though I am willing to bet that any type of wine or champagne would also be amazing.
Will you be making some champagne-soaked grapes this New Year’s Eve?