Full of flavour and served piping hot, mulled wine is a quintessential part of cold winter evenings, especially around Christmas time.
Although the ingredients sound simple enough, procuring the spices and measuring out exact quantities often becomes a hassle when people are coming over for a party.
These spice kits by Delhi-based ventures are making it easy to have the perfect mulled wine, ready to serve to guests.
Wine, the conscious way
Started 11 months ago by Australian expatriate in Delhi Eliana Koulas, Farm Two One offers a range of products inspired by Koulas’ own desire for clean eating.
“I have always been a consumer of conscious foods. Eventually I ended up developing my own products, because I could not find the ones I wanted,” shared Koulas, a Sainik Farms-resident,who has been living in India since 2005.
Koulas prepares and combines her ingredients herself, in her kitchen. “Christmas is a very special time of the year. People are embracing it a lot more, and making it a bigger part of their celebrations. We noticed that nobody was doing mulled wine spice kits at any scale.
The idea behind our spice bombs was, ‘how do we simplify the whole mulled wine process?’ People invite their friends over for Christmas and parties, but no one wants to do the brain work of how much of each ingredient to add, if they even have the herbs in their kitchens. I wanted to make this easy for people,” said Koulas, adding that she also developed her own jaggery as an addition to the spice bombs.
“We also needed a sweetener, but being a conscious food brand, we do not use sugar. So I developed my own jaggery, which has the same flavour profile as the spice bombs. The response has been phenomenal so far.”
A customisable recipe
“I have been working in the food and beverage space for around seven years,” shared Geetanjali Enclave resident Sanjhi Rajgarhia, founder of Foodcloud, which is a marketplace for food by home-chefs. Her new venture Craft Cocktail Company caters to millennials.
“I felt there was a dearth of great cocktail kits. People were coming over to homes for gatherings, instead of bars, especially during the lockdown. We wanted to provide easy and affordable kits, with which you can make exciting cocktails,” she explained.
The mulled wine kit is the first kit Rajgarhia has ideated and launched. A certified home chef, she makes the kits herself, as well.
“The idea came to me last winter. I had recently gotten married, and people were coming over afterwards. I wanted to make mulled wine, but I never had the ingredients.”
The kit comes with various spices, a recipe, and an instruction manual for people to tweak according to their likes.
“Mulled wine is not just about having the right ingredients, but it is also about knowing how to make it. We put a very detailed instruction booklet inside so people can make the wine according to their own taste,” she concluded.