Everyone knows having the right drinks at your Christmas party is the key to getting things off to a good start, and to help you along we though we’d offer up our favourite serves of the season, featuring some cool new drinks brands and a few heritage names to boot.
We’ve split our easy Christmas cocktail recipes into three simple sections for quick navigation: there is a section for gin, whisky and Champagne cocktails below, with two drink options for each. There’s of course no one right way to serve cocktails, but we must say that we enjoy them stirred up at the start of the night and presented with nibbly food or canapés before a dinner or some warming bowl food, and a roaring open fire and some candlelight doesn’t hurt proceedings often either. Robust olives and charcuterie go wonderfully with the herby G&T serve suggestion below, while something like a light and fruity falafel would pair perfectly with the rose notes in the second gin cocktail idea. Looking to the Champagne and nothing says Christmas more than a spruced up sausage roll with buttery, golden pastry flaking away in your mouth in between drinking from a bright and bubbly glass of fizz.
The beautiful thing about these easy cocktails is that it really doesn’t matter how, where or when you serve them - they’re delicious whatever the circumstances that surround them. Happy hosting (even if it’s just for you and your other half), cheers!
Easy gin cocktail recipes
Gin, without a doubt, has had the biggest popularity resurgence in recent years, and it’s not hard to see why. This punchy juniper-scented drink pairs beautifully with a simple tonic mixer, or can become the base for all kinds of fruity, floral and spicy sips. The easy gin cocktail recipes below can easily be mixed up in minutes, making them the perfect drinks to help you impress family and friends with.
Pink peppercorn and sage G&T
Herby and heady, the perfect way to start the evening
Dash sugar syrup
Pinch pink peppercorns, lightly crushed
A few sage leaves
50ml No. 3 Gin
100ml Fever Tree Mediterranean tonic water
Crushed ice, to serve
1. Dip the rim of a glass in sugar syrup and roll in peppercorns and sage leaves.
2. Add the gin and tonic to the glass, stir, and add the ice.
Rose and rhubarb gin
Floral and fruity, this is one for getting everyone in the party mood
For the rhubarb syrup:
300g rhubarb, chopped
85g caster sugar
For the cocktail:
50ml Tinkture rose gin
25ml syrup
Soda water, to top up
Ice, to serve
Rhubarb sticks, to garnish
1. For the syrup add the rhubarb and sugar to 75ml water. Simmer for 5mins. Strain and return the liquid to the pan, boiling rapidly for 10mins until syrupy. Remove from the heat.
2. To serve add the gin and syrup to the glass, top with soda water, ice, and the rhubarb sticks.
Easy whisky cocktail recipes
With its complex, rich and warming tones, whisky can be an acquired taste, but we find those who fall in love with this amber nectar quickly become diehard fans. From the honeyed flavours of bourbon to the peaty-rich scent of a Scotch, these two easy whisky cocktail recipes really do offer something for everyone, whatever mood you’re in. If you’re new to whisky, we think a sour is the perfect entry level cocktail to get you hooked.
Pear and ginger whisky twist
The sweet fruit juice in this simple serve mellows out the rich whisky
50ml Laphroaig 10
50ml pear juice
50ml Fevertree ginger ale
Pear slice, to serve
Ice, to serve
1. Stir the whisky, juice, ginger ale and ice together in a glass, adding the pear slice to finish.
Blood orange whiskey sour
Smooth and silky, this is like dessert in a glass
50ml Makers Mark
15ml lemon juice
15ml blood orange juice
20ml sugar syrup
1 egg white
Ice, to shake and to serve
1 dried blood orange slice, to serve
1. Add all the ingredients, except for the orange slice, to a cocktail shaker and shake hard for a few mins.
2. Strain into a glass filled with more ice. Add the orange slice and serve.
Easy Champagne cocktail recipes
Nothing says celebration like a glass of fizz, and these easy Champagne cocktails deliver just a little added something for some seriously festive fun. Go for a classic blackcurrant fizz for a sophisticated and familiar start to proceedings, or throw caution to the wind with a bergamot-scented aperitif with the second easy Champagne cocktail below.
Blackcurrant Fizz
A classic champagne deserves a class serve
Crushed ice, to serve
100ml Nicolas Feuillatte Reserve Exclusive Brut NV Champagne
25ml British Cassis
Frozen blackberries
1. Fill a glass with crushed ice and pour over the Champagne, followed by the cassis. Serve with frozen blackberries.
Bergamot bubbly
This makes a really interesting aperitif, with herbaceous notes throughout
100ml Nicolas Feuillatte Reserve Exclusive Brut NV Champagne
25ml Italicus Rosolio di Bergamotto
1. Pour the Champagne and Italicus Rosolio into a chilled champagne flute and serve.
If mocktails are more your thing then you might like our round up of classic non-alcoholic cocktails