Serve this Snowball Old Fashioned at your next holiday party
Mackensy LunsfordThis is part of Southern Kitchen's 12 Days of Cookies and Cocktails series, which runs daily through Christmas Eve. Each day, we'll pair fun and festive cocktails with classic cookie recipes. This Snowball Old Fashioned pairs perfectly with our Chocolate Snowcap Cookies in both flavor and aesthetic. Get the recipe here.
What do you get when you cross Christmas cheer and tiki tipples? You get Sippin' Santa, a series of holiday pop-up events taking over bars across the country this season. Find your closest location here.
The first Sippin' Santa took place in 2015 at Boilermaker in New York City, partnering with tiki connoisseur Jeff “Beachbum” Berry three years later.
Berry, who's been named one of Imbibe magazine’s “25 Most Influential Cocktail Personalities of the Past Century” and one of Drinks International’s “100 Most Influential Figures,” has partnered with award-winning bartender Brad Smith to create a number of tiki holiday-themed cocktails showcased at the Sippin' Santa pop-ups.
Berry is back with Sippin’ Santa again this year after the event skipped 2020 in response to the pandemic. He'll help produce the pop-ups through the U.S., including at his own bar in New Orleans, Latitude 29. Each bar will be transformed into a twinkling, boughs-of-holly-festooned Christmas spirit extravaganza, replete with really killer drinks.
This year's roster of cocktails has a kitschy twist and features soon-to-be-faves including the Jingle Balls Nog. You can even bring the party home, as Sippin' Santa is sharing some of its coveted recipes with Southern Kitchen, including this take on an Old Fashioned.
It's a festive powerhouse of a sipper, punched up with a gingerbread syrup. The syrup recipe will yield much more than you'll need, but it will keep for a few weeks in the fridge and can be used again and again in tea, over ice cream or in more cocktails.
And a note on the snowball ice: You can find spherical ice molds in kitchen supply stores and on Amazon. More about Sippin' Santa at www.sippinsantapopup.com.
Ingredients
2 ounces Rittenhouse or other rye
½ “scant” ounce of Gingerbread Syrup (recipe follows)
2 dashes aromatic Angostura bitters
2 dashes Cocktail Kingdom Wormwood Bitters
Orange zest (to express and discard)
Snowball ice
Instructions
In a mixing glass, combine all ingredients with cracked ice and stir well.
Strain into a double rocks glass.
Add the snowball ice.
Express orange zest over the drink and discard the peel.
Gingerbread Syrup
5 cups water
8 1/2 cups of white sugar
1/3 cup molasses (Grandma’s Original)
7 cinnamon sticks
30 whole cloves
20 whole allspice pods
1 ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
80 grams fresh ginger, peeled and chopped
Instructions
Combine chopped ginger and approximately half of the water to a blender cup or food processor, and mix. Set aside.
Crack and grind all the dried spices and add to a large saucepan.
Toast over low to medium heat until aromatic, mixing regularly so as to not burn.
Add remaining water to the saucepan and bring to a boil. Boil for 3 minutes.
Lower heat and add sugar, blended ginger, and molasses and heat again until simmering and sugar has dissolved.
Remove from heat and allow to cool.
Strain using a bouillon strainer.
Bottle, date, and refrigerate.
DAY 2 MOSCOW MULE:How to make a classic and simply refreshing Moscow Mule cocktail
DAY 1 SPICED WASSAIL:This spiced wassail from the Biltmore Estate is perfect for caroling or simply enjoying