Like em white, red or fruity?

Wine’s always been a pain in the head for me. The bitter taste, the dry feeling it leaves in its wake and a headache every time I’ve had too much of it makes it difficult for me to go beyond the occasional glass at most places. Discovering sangria, or in other words a wine punch, was a revelation. The fruits bring about mellowness and takes away some of the wine’s bite — a taste which is more to my liking.

It helps that the sangria culture is mushrooming. The Grand Hyatt’s restaurant Fifty Five East, for example, has started offering sangria as a part of the daily buffet. The number of cuisines offered alongside can result in a head-spin though, the drink coupled with everything from Thai, sushi and Lebanese to Indian and western food. What made the experience really worth it is the sangria itself.

It made sense starting with white wine and then moving up. There were three white sangrias on offer: one that mixed white wine with peach, one that mixed it with pear, and the other with green apple. The red sangria, on the other hand, mixed red wine with melon. These are different from the traditional sangria, which mixes red wine with orange juice and brandy-plus-rum. “We have the traditional sangria as part of the menu, in case people want to go for the tried-and-tested, but we have our own concoctions on offer,” says Julien Lloyd, assistant director, F&B, Grand Hyatt.
The number of people opting for sangria from the menu has gone up at the hotel, even though it plays second fiddle to the more traditional cocktails like margarita on Sundays, when sangria isn’t necessarily a part of the buffet. “However, sangria sales on Sundays are almost identical to wine sales. People probably take to sangria faster; wine is more acquired taste,” says Lloyd.

Most restaurants, including Fifty Five East, stick to their own sangria concoctions largely. I insisted on trying my red sangria with green apple at the restaurant, and it turned out to be a concoction I enjoyed the most, much to the amusement of the bartender. “The sangria culture is still work-in-progress. There’s no one perfect concoction — it largely depends on taste,” says Lloyd.

Mix and match
The difference in taste between red and white sangria is more or less the difference between red and white wine itself, explains Sheldon Pereira, the bar manager at F Lounge and Diner. “Red sangria, like the wine itself, is a heavier drink. Your choice of sangria would largely depend on the kind of wine you prefer,” says Pereira, adding that red wine mixes best with apple, orange and pear, while white goes best with kiwi, litchi and pineapple. When making the drink at home, you can change the kind of red wine according to your preference too. sangria mixed with merlot, for example, will be on the fruitier side, while a cabinet sauvignon makes Sangria peppier, says Sheldon.

Cecilia Oldne, head of international business at Sula Vinoteca, likes the menu to not stick to any such rule though. While listing out the essentials to make a wine punch tasty and fun, she makes it clear that the drinker “shouldn’t be afraid to experiment.” Grape, orange, pineapple, litchi and guava juices can be mixed interchangeably with both red and white sangria, she says.

Oldne’s personal favourite, though, is a sparkling sangria, not a concoction available at most other places. “Sparkling wine tastes great with orange, apple, watermelon, pomegranate seeds and pear. The drink’s flavour keeps changing through the year too, with the wine being mixed with whatever fruit’s available in the season.” Oldne talks of sangrias with much passion, at one point calling it “fun and uncomplicated” like she’s affectionately referring to an old romance. My own affair with sangria is just about getting started.

Do try this at home

Get together these elements:
A bottle of (cheap) red wine
A 7up, Sprite or another sparkling lemon drink
A glass of liquor (ideally brandy, whiskey or cointreau)
Fruit punch comprising of orange, apple, pear
Sugar to taste

Dip the fruits in brandy overnight. Mix with red wine and a dash of Sprite. Chill and serve. Alternatively, mix and match the wine with other fruits of choice + fizzy drink.