3 Holiday Cocktails Made with Superfoods
The holiday season is a time of celebration, which means many parties to attend, toasts (not the avocado kind) included.
So, you might as well make sure your cocktails are chock full of healthy ingredients (hello, matcha tea, carrot juice, and fresh-pressed beets) to help balance out the role that alcohol plays in your cup of holiday cheer.
That’s the kind of inspiration you get hanging out with Grant Wheeler, the beverage director at Den Hospitality, which owns super trendy cocktail bars The Garret East and The Garret West in Manhattan. Wheeler’s a big proponent of shaking and stirring with superfood mixers.
RELATED: 3 healthier holiday cocktails made with tea
“A lot of bartenders, myself included, have an affinity for rhum agricole and cachaca, which is rum made from sugarcane rather than molasses, that has a grassy and vegetal quality,” Wheeler says. “The most obvious culinary analog those is fresh-pressed vegetable juice. I figured, why not try putting these two together because they have parallels across my palate?”
Scroll down to see three of Wheeler’s genius recipes that include superfoods—and even sweet potato vodka!—that will make you want to say cheers like you really mean it.
RELATED: 8 under-the-radar superfoods you need to try
A cocktail made with matcha (Photo: Brandon O’Leary)
The Green Monstah
1 oz Avuá Prata Cachaça
½ oz Avuá Amburana Cachaça
½ oz Tamworth Sweet Potato Vodka
½ oz lemon juice
½ barspoon matcha powder
½ oz gomme syrup
Add all ingredients to a cocktail shaker, shake and serve over one ice cube in a Japanese tea cup.
This one is made with apple cider vinegar (Photo: Brandon O’Leary)
The Tituba
2 oz Rhum Barbancourt 3 Star
2 oz fresh-pressed carrot juice
¾ oz orgeat syrup
3 dashes fennel bitters
1 barspoon Bragg Organic Raw Unfiltered Apple Cider Vinegar
RELATED: 10 healthy ways to use apple cider vinegar
Add all ingredients to a cocktail shaker, strain into a Collins glass over ice.
Load up on fresh-pressed beet juice (Photo: Brandon O’Leary)
Detroit Dancehall
1 oz Rhum Barbancourt White
½ oz Rhum Barbancourt 3 Star
1 oz fresh-pressed beet juice
½ oz lime juice
½ oz orgeat syrup
Add all ingredients to a shaker, shake, and serve neat in a chilled juice glass (8 oz or so) with a sloppy half rim of vinegar salt.
By Jamie McKillop for Well+GOOD
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