Wine Cocktail Wednesday – Prestige Spritzer

Wine Cocktail Wednesday: Prestige Spritzer

INGREDIENTS:

1/4 Cup ice

2 Tablespoons frozen berries of your choice

2 oz Wilde Cock Prestige Gold

6 oz sparkling water (La Croix recommended because of it’s subtle flavor and no added sweetness)

DIRECTIONS:

Pour ice into a glass. Add frozen berries. Pour in the wine, then the sparkling water. Sip and enjoy.

Wine Cocktail Wednesday – Blushing Beauty

Wine Cocktail Wednesday: Blushing Beauty

INGREDIENTS:

1 Tablespoon + 3/4 teaspoon unflavored gelatin (2 packets)

1 C water, divided

1 C sugar

1 bottle Wilde Cock Blush

DIRECTIONS:

Sprinkle the gelatin over ¼ cup of the water in a small bowl. Set aside for a few minutes to rehydrate.

Combine the remaining water and the sugar in a small saucepan over medium heat and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Remove from the heat.

Add the gelatin to the sugar syrup and stir to dissolve. Combine with the wine in a medium mixing bowl or a 9-inch square baking pan. Refrigerate for 3 hours, until set.

Serve with fresh whipped cream and berries!

Wine Cocktail Wednesday – Honey, Grab the Apples!

Wine Cocktail Wednesday: Honey, Grab the Apples!

A Widle Cock Apple wine cocktail infused with the flavors of honey and lemon.

INGREDIENTS (1 cocktail):

1 1/2 Tablespoon honey

1/2 Tablespoon hot water

2 tsp – 1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice

4 oz Wilde Cock Apple wine

DIRECTIONS:

Dissolve honey in hot water. Add lemon juice and wine; stir. Fill glass with ice, pour in wine cocktail, and garnish with lemon slice!

Barbara’s Favorite Flowers: Cyclamen

Barbara’s Favorite Flowers: Cyclamen

Barbara’s list of favorite winter blooming flowers for Willow Creek Farm & Winery and Southern Mansion gardens includes Cyclamen. Here’s what Barbara has to say:

Several years ago, I became all atwitter about winter gardening; having flowers blooming year round even in November through February.  For several seasons in a row, we had been blessed with mild winters, and I was feeling rather pleased with my gardening prowess. Having overwintered Gloriosa Rothschildiana, and numerous Dahlias, I was confident that I was up to the task. Unfortunately my sin of superbia was about to become all too apparent when Outer Coastal Cape May was thwacked with a couple seasons of bitter, windy, wet, and cold weather. Oh well, this seasoned plantswoman is used to getting her comeuppance on occasion, and being perennially optimistic I started planting something new, and questionably hardy, as soon as I had the chance. But as brainy, is of course the new sexy, it’s really just as well, and at the very least not boring.

Many of you are familiar with the florist cyclamen (frost tender), with their brilliant hot pink, fuchsia and white reverse lipstick colored flowers, wonderful lovely dark green often heart shaped leaves delicious with white marbling. Easily attainable at the local market, we purchase and place these Cyclamen in pots as decorations inside our homes.

Each flower is on a stem coming from a growing point on the circular flat tuber of the Cyclamen. In all species, the stem is bent 150-180° at the tip, so that the nose of the flower faces downward. Flowers have five petals, are bent outwards or up, can sometimes be twisted, are connected at the base into a cup, and have five sepals behind the cup.

What I focus on here is the hardy winter bloomers such as c.coum. Cyclamen are a genus of twenty species within the family Primulaceae, which originates in the Mediterranean areas (Turkey, North Africa etc.). I had received my first hardy cyclamens from Sunshine Nurseries’ Barry Glick. There is something really fabulous about seeing a brilliant hot pink flower poking out of the dull brown ground when the skies are despondently cold and gray. I find it a tremendous pick me up in the short days of late fall and winter, especially in those deepest days right before the winter solstice. Also, it really does give you a sense of accomplishment to summon forth such a burst of happy color this time of year, whilst in the spring and summer it’s rather a tad redundant.

Covet, plant, and enjoy the Cyclamen in all their frivolous forms!

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