In Federico Fellini's 1965 film Juliet of the Spirits, a woman comes home to find a tall, dark Spanish stranger mixing Sangria in her moonlit garden. "It quenches the thirst of those who drink it," he says as he fills her tumbler. "It quenches our secret thirsts, too." It's one of the most elegant preparations of a mixed drink ever put to film, performed by the famously dapper playboy José Luis de Vilallonga—no matter that his recipe, which calls for a few slices of citrus, some sugar, wine, and mineral water, is more of a wine spritzer than anything else. I'd rather sip the stripped-down Sangria of Fellini's Italian garden than what passes for Sangria on many American restaurant tables: pitchers of plonk, overflowing with chunks of fruit, so cloyingly sweet that you can practically hear tomorrow's hangover unpacking its bags when you take the first sip.
Sangria is, at its best, a wine punch with fresh fruit. Red, white, rosé, or sparkling wine can be used, and the quality of the wine you choose will have a great effect on the finished product. (To that end, my recipes are specific on ingredients, so as to eliminate the guesswork and deliver superb results. I even bent the rules—one recipe calls for Dolin dry vermouth, and one for Dubonnet, both excellent wine-based products that are increasingly available across the country.) Sangria is usually fortified with a shot or two of brandy or other spirit to add a little depth of flavor. Sugar should be used to balance out the sourness of the citrus, not to smooth the rough edges of inferior ingredients. Done correctly, Sangria is simple to prepare, and deceptively easy to drink.
这里的挑战是使红、白、蓝e Sangrias, which one could serve at a Fourth of July party, or on any other occasion with a patriotic spirit, such as Memorial Day or Labor Day. The recipes for the red and white versions were no-brainers, but from what ingredient could I extract a vibrant, star-spangled blue? Muddled blackberries read a rosy purple, blueberries give little if any color at all, and that about exhausts the natural food world (blue corn and blue potatoes just seemed a little too far afield). And so I leaned on that reviled crutch of the mixology world: blue curaçao. If you're not excited about adding FD&C Blue No. 1 to your diet, just use regular orange curaçao instead—and raise a toast to the old red, white, and very pale blue.
