Sangria, Shows, and Sugar Highs

The brunch and trunk show can be deemed a success!  I think I had about 30 people here for brunch and some day-drinking by the pool while shopping.  As previously mentioned, I had gone on a massive bake-a-thon to sell baked goods and promote my new venture; Tammi brought jars of preserves, apple butter, and some of her crocheted items; Allie brought her Elodee headbands and hair clips; and Brandi had jewelry.  Everyone thought it was a great idea and a good way to get together.  I will definitely be doing it again.

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It is HOT.  I think we hit 105 today.  You know what that means:  It is officially pool time in Arizona.  While I understand the allure of a cold beer by the pool, sometimes you need something a little fancier.  Today, I made white wine sangria.

Previously described as summer in a glass...  Also pictured, fresh limeade.

What you need:

One LARGE bottle of white wine
Diet Gingerale
Various Fruits  ((suggestions:  orange, lime, strawberries, grapefruit))

How to:

When shopping, look for the biggest and probably the cheapest bottle of white wine you can find.  I found Barefoot Pinot Grigio in a 1.5 liter bottle for 7 bucks so I went with that.

The night prior, pour the wine into a glass pitcher.  If you are using a normal person sized bottle, it will only fill one pitcher about halfway and you will really feel ripped off.  I split the 1.5 liter into two separate pitchers.

Cut up various kinds of fruit.  You can really use anything that you have.  In the pic above, I used oranges, limes, frozen raspberries, and strawberries.  For today ((pictured below)), I used oranges, strawberries, lemon, and kiwi.   ((I intended to throw in some mango, but they were past their prime.))

Take the fruit and squeeze the living bejeezus of it into the pitcher.  You can also take a wooden spoon and smash the hell out of it in the pitcher as well.  This will not result in the prettiest presentation though.  If you want it to look more "polished" or something ((I can't come up with a better word)) don't smash it, just throw it in.  Refrigerate overnight, covering the top of the pitcher with a piece of saran wrap.  I usually secure it on with a rubber band as well since for some reason saran wrap doesn't always seal that tightly.

The following day, fill the pitcher the rest of the way with diet gingerale.  Give it a few stirs and add a few handfuls of ice.  Done!  Some people add more sugar to it, but I think that is completely unnecessary.  We are sugary enough.  I'm drawing the line.  

Here's a kind of crappy picture that I took today:

Both of these pitchers disappeared within about an hour, so I'm going to assume they were good!  ((I personally was into the strawberry vodka lemonade which was also really fracking good.))

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Okay kiddos.  It is time to get serious.  I have 60 days to pull my act together so here we go: CLEAN LIVING.  No more risottos.  No more cheesecake.  No more sugar bombs.  Oh who am I kidding?  I'll still be making that stuff for other people, so there will still be some treats around here.  BUT, you can also expect more healthy, yet still interesting and flavorful recipes.  In the mean time, cheers!