Mulled wine season: Warm spice for the winter

JNow it’s finally available in pink. Or should we say: rosé. After all, the good old mulled wine has the wine in its name – and in times when rosé has become an irresistible trend all over the world and hardly any winegrower dares to follow this trend, the guardians of German wine legislation apparently didn’t want it either keep getting in the way. Quite atypically and without much ado, they overturned the old rule that mulled wine may only be made from red or white wine.

The winegrowers are happy about that, because they can combine two megatrends and bring rosé mulled wine to the people with a clear conscience. Because just as little as without rosé, you can’t do without your own Christmas spiced wine variant these days. The mulled wine hype has long been too strong for that and can be compared with the intensity of other seasonal fashions such as asparagus, herring or St. Martin’s goose. Everyone wants to benefit from the ever-growing mulled wine wave.

Renaissance of mulled wine

And the times when only a few bottles with wintry kitsch labels served the segment in the supermarket are long gone. Today, from mid-November, dozens of different brands with deer, moose and funny names like “Glühvieh”, “Schietwetter” or “Glow” are on the shelves. Ikea has the Swedish version, and even reputable wine shops offer the flavored, wine-based drinks now at surprising prices.

At least as amazing as the renaissance of the hot drink, which has been popular in many parts of Europe for more than 200 years, is the range of quality and taste on offer. Originally, white or red wines were heated and sweetened with spices such as cinnamon, cloves, lemon peel and star anise for mulled wine. Today, the aromatic palette is much broader and cheap versions are often spiced up with artificial flavorings.

It is therefore worthwhile to look at the label of the mulled wine to take home and pay attention to the quality – and then try it out a bit to determine your own taste preferences. Perhaps the very vinous, subtly spiced white mulled wine from Kloster Eberbach, which instead has a lot of grapey fruitiness, has what it takes to become a favourite? Or rather the plumy-cherry red spice drops from the Sylt Sansibar? Some people may like the extremely clove-flavoured “Glüh Dich Glück” best, but many certainly prefer a significantly less sweetened winemaker’s mulled wine, such as that from the Rettig winery in Westhofen, Rhine-Hesse.

We identified our favorite right at the beginning of the season: it comes from the Nahe winery Tesch and is part of their collection for the Wacken Open Air. The “Full Metal Glögg” is very harmoniously seasoned with cloves, cinnamon, ginger and cardamom, full-bodied but not too sweet – and ideal for finishing with a shot of rum or vodka.