Warm red wine takes on cinnamon, star anise and a little clove, lifted by strips of citrus zest. Serve in small heatproof cups for a relaxed autumn or winter gathering.
Allow for preparation, gentle warming, a 30-minute infusion off the heat and rewarming. The spices need no advance soak; avoid boiling the wine.
Recipe illustrations; measure ingredients using the written quantities.
Wash the citrus fruit. Pare strips of coloured zest with a vegetable peeler and remove any white pith to limit bitterness. Weigh 3 g cinnamon and 1.5 g star anise, keeping them in large pieces or whole, and check for loose fragments. Cloves are bought separately. These amounts are for the pan, not the full 60 g retail packs.
Put wine, sugar, cinnamon, star anise, cloves and zest in a small stainless-steel or enamelled pan. Warm over low heat for about 10 minutes, stirring gently until the sugar dissolves. Keep it steaming gently without boiling hard, and cover partly to reduce evaporation.
Remove from the heat, cover and leave for about 30 minutes. Taste a little and dissolve a small amount of extra sugar if needed. Strain through a fine sieve into a clean pan, discarding spices and zest and checking no hard fragments remain. This infusion is not room-temperature storage.
Rewarm gently for about 5–10 minutes until comfortably hot to drink, without boiling, and pour into small heatproof cups. Leave hard cinnamon and star anise out of the cups; a strained orange-zest strip may sit beside them. This remains an alcoholic drink: warming does not make it alcohol-free.
Wine commonly contains sulphites; check the bottle and other ingredient labels. The Xianyitang dried-ingredient packs state that they are packed in a facility also handling peanuts, tree nuts, sesame and soya. Check the actual labels of every brand used.
Best served the same day. Strain unused wine, cool promptly in shallow heatproof containers and refrigerate at 5°C or below within 2 hours. Use within 48 hours and rewarm only the amount needed, once. Do not leave the pan at room temperature overnight or rely on its alcohol content instead of refrigeration.
