River trips, beach moves and pool parties are a few of the hallmarks of summertime. For those fortunate enough to call Jamaica and other Caribbean islands home, it’s year-round island life fun. Whenever lists are made and distributed, the wine-related drinks usually fall to me. As the recent disappointing results of the IAAF World Championships in London were all that some of my friends were talking about, I decided to console myself with some creative wine cocktail options that were not too complicated and that I could easily make. My research unearthed hundreds of recipes, the most popular being some version of frozen or slushie type drinks, spritzers, poptails and winesicles. I tried to make a few at home.

Frosé

“Ole time someting come back again.” Frozen cocktails are certainly not new; however, this idea of the frozen rosé wine called Frosé (or Frozé) burst on the scene in the summer of 2016 its origin was an Italian restaurant in New York called Bar Primi. The mixologists (I imagine) decided to throw rosé wine into a slushie machine to see what would happen. Its popularity has risen to new heights this year as mixologists worldwide have come up with scores of new recipes and methods of making this adult slushie. One popular epicurean website has created a recipe for home in a blender. Their recipe calls for freezing the wine which may take up to eight hours, creating your own strawberry syrup and doing some blending; this is not a quick process. I found methods that could be done in one afternoon, and tried a few.

I poured a chilled bottle of rosé into a blender, added a few handfuls of frozen strawberries, tossed in roughly two cups of ice and sweetener to taste. I used three tablespoons of sugar, which my guest said made the drink too sweet, so I had to discard and start the process over. Blend (and keep adding ice, if needed) until you reach the perfect slushie consistency. We all pondered, after tasting it, that maybe it be taste better in a slushie machine, but while it was nice, we did not see the big deal. Next time I will try to make ‘frosecco’ – frozen prosecco slushies.

Poptails and Winesicles

So the mixologists have moved from the boozy slushie to freezing their concoctions and coming up with cocktail popsicles with names like Winesicles or Poptails. I found a very interesting cocktail on a stick idea made with equal parts papaya and rosé wine. I am sure you can try it with any of your favorite fruits. The method requires you to peel the papaya and remove the seeds, Purée the fruit in a blender or food processor, mix about 1 1/2 cups puree with an equal amount of rose. Stir well to combine, then pour the mixture into a popsicle mould. This will have to freeze overnight so I will try this one another time.

Do let your imagination run wild with all sorts of wine-based cocktails that you can experiment with this summer.

Christopher Reckord – Information Technology Entrepreneur & Wine Enthusiast. Send your questions and comments to creckord@gmail.com. You can also follow me on Facebook, Instagram @chrisreckord and on Twitter: @Reckord