Contents
Wine and Champagne Cocktail Basics
Wine & Champagne Cocktail Recipes
Acadian Cooler
Adonis
The Anglophile
Atlanta Cooler
Aubrietta
Belle of the Ball
Bellini
Berry Cooler
Brandied Port
Champagne Bleu
Champagne Cocktail
Champagne with Schnapps
Cranberry Cocktail
Danish Ruby
European Swinger
French Orgasm
Grand Champagne
Hillary Wallbanger
The Jackie Lee
Kingston Kooler
Kir
Kir Royale
Lemonberry
Limoncello Cooler
London Express
The Matador
Mimosa
Miss Linda’s Pleasure
Mother of Pearl
Nouméa Cooler
Passion Fizz
Port Pleasant
Portuguese Daisy
Red Wine Refresher
Rick’s Whitewater
Sanibel Cooler
Señor Valdez
Spritzers
Sweetheart
Tear Drop
Vanilla Skies
White Wine Cooler
Zoe’s Cabernet Cobbler
Learn more with these titles from Barnes & Noble
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- The best red and white wines to use for making cocktails
- A breakdown of the differences between various sparkling wines
- Wine and champagne cocktail recipes from the Four Seasons restaurant
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Wine and Champagne Cocktail Basics
Wine-based cocktails come in endless varieties: red wines, white wines, champagne, other sparkling wines, and fortified wines can all make great cocktail ingredients. When making wine cocktails, it’s generally a good idea to use inexpensive wines—fine wines are best
appreciated for their complexity and nuances, not for what they add to mixed drinks. In fact, plenty of wines that are great for making cocktails are sold for under $12 per bottle.
Though champagne-based drinks are served without ice, other wine-based cocktails can be enjoyed either straight up or on the rocks, unless otherwise noted.
White Wine–Based Cocktails
Rather than specify a wine by name, most recipes for white wine–based cocktails call for either a sweet white wine or a dry to medium-dry white wine. When making these cocktails, it’s important to know which wines fall into which category.
- Dry to medium-dry white wines: Among the white wine grapes on the drier side are Sauvignon Blanc, found in the Sancerres of France and the Marlborough sauvignon blancs of New Zealand; the Italian Pinot Grigio (known as Pinot Gris in France); Chardonnay, the dominant grape of white Burgundies and countless California whites; and the German Riesling, whose wines run from very dry to very sweet (Rieslings labeled Kabinett and Trocken are driest).
- Sweet whites wines: Sweet white wines include Sauternes, Barsac, and some versions of Vouvray (France); Riesling Auslese (Germany); and Tokaji (Hungary). Other sweet wines are made from the Muscat grape (Moscato in Italy, Moscatel in Spain). Ice wine, or Eiswein, is sweet because the grapes are picked after freezing temperatures have concentrated their sugars.
For more information about white wine in general, see the Quamut guide to Wine.
Red Wine–Based Cocktails
Red wine cocktail recipes usually call for either dry, fruity, or sweet reds.
- Dry reds: Dry reds include Bordeaux, Bandol, reds from the Languedoc and Roussillon provinces, and most Côtes du Rhône (France); Chianti Classico, Barbaresco, and Nebbiolo d’Alba (Italy); Rioja and Ribera del Duero (Spain); and reds that are 80% or more Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Malbec, or Primitivo.
- Fruity reds: Fruity doesn’t mean sweet, but rather describes a wine whose flavor and aroma suggest fresh fruit. Fruity reds include Burgundy (the dominant grape of which is Pinot Noir), Beaujolais, and Corbières (France); Dolchetto, Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, and Barbera d’Alba (Italy); Shiraz (Australia); and Montsant (Spain). The Zinfandel grape also makes fruity wines, most of which come from California.
- Sweet reds: The few sweet reds to choose from include late-harvest Zinfandel, as well as two Italian reds, Recioto and Vin Santo—both made from “raisined” grapes that have been sun-dried to concentrate their sugars.
For more information about red wine in general, see the Quamut guide to Wine.
Champagne- and Sparkling Wine–Based Cocktails
Though champagne is by far the best known of the sparkling wines, and the sparkling wine most often used to make cocktails, other sparkling wines are commonly used as well.
Champagne
Champagnes are white wines that have been bottled and carbonated using what’s called the méthode champenoise. Though other sparkling wines can be made using this method, the méthode champenoise originated in the Champagne region, and by law only sparkling wines produced in this manner from the Champagne region can be called champagne.
In the méthode champenoise, a white wine that has already been distilled, fermented, and blended is immediately bottled with a starter of yeast and sugar, called the tirage. A second fermentation then takes place in the bottle, resulting in additional alcohol and the carbon dioxide that gives sparking wine its effervescence. Any new sediment is removed, and sweetness or dryness is adjusted with a dash of sugar called the dosage. The bottle is then resealed with a cork and wire cage to ensure that the cork won’t pop before the bottle is opened. Finished champagne comes in varying degrees of sweetness, which are designated on the label. From driest to sweetest, the categories are extra brut (very, very dry—no sweetness); brut (very dry—the most popular style); extra dry (off-dry); sec (lightly sweet); demi-sec (sweet); and doux (very sweet).
Other Sparkling Wines
Though some producers of nonchampagne sparkling wines use the méthode champenoise to carbonate their sparkling wines, most employ the faster, less expensive bulk process, which dates from the early 1900s. It is also called the Charmat process, after the man who developed it—Eugéne Charmat of Bordeaux. In this method, the wines are carbonated in stainless steel vats rather than bottles. Though they’re bottled under pressure, they tend to lose bubbles more quickly once the wine is poured.
Generally speaking, the more pressurized a sparkling wine is in the bottle, the more plentiful and the smaller its bubbles will be. The degree of bubbliness is broken down into four categories, as shown in the table below.
Bubbliness |
Descriptive Terms |
Examples |
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Fully sparkling |
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Moderately sparkling |
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Semi-sparkling |
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Barely sparkling |
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Fortified Wines
Fortified wines are wines that have had their alcohol contents increased through the addition of a distilled spirit, which is most often brandy. The fortified wines most commonly used to make cocktails are:
- Sherry: A fortified wine made in or around the Spanish town of Jerez, sherry can range from pale and dry (Fino and Manzanilla) to somewhat richer (Amontillado and Oloroso) to sweet (sweet sherry or cream sherry).
- Port: A typically sweet and rich fortified wine made in the Douro region of Portugal. Port is made by adding distilled grape spirits to either red or white wines and then aging the newly fortified wine. There are many types of port, depending on the process used to age the port and the length of time it was aged. Ruby port is the type of port most commonly used in cocktails because it is the least expensive.
- Madeira: A dark, mellow fortified wine made in the Madeira Islands of Portugal. Madeira is made using a unique aging process that involves relatively high heat and results in a wine that’s soft and mellow, with a depth of flavor and slightly burnt taste.
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