3 Seasonal Signature Cocktails

Seasonal Cocktails to Refresh Your Wedding

While organizing a wedding menu, couples will customarily elect to serve a seasonal spread, taking advantage of local retailers and their ability to provide the best ingredients. This provides an enjoyable dining experience, but what many couples don’t tend to think about is their cocktail menu. If you’re serving seasonal food, why not serve seasonal drinks?

As in cooking, using fresh ingredients yields superior results, therefore using plants that are in season will produce undeniably exceptional drinks. Even if only for garnishes, implementing the freshest herbs, spices, and essences raise the quality of a cocktail remarkably. Additionally, many seasonal flavours complement each other and work well to create a comprehensive drink menu.

Cocktails That’ll Put a Spring in Your Step

Even the thought of Spring evokes a feeling of rebirth and renewal. It’s no wonder the flavours associated with the season are light and slightly sweet. Most Spring cocktails incorporate honey or ginger, but are no stranger to subtly tart tangerines and succulent nectarines. Moreover, as it’s a time of regrowth, Spring is forever linked to the colour green, so it’s no wonder cucumber, green tea, and honeydew melon occasionally make appearances in these fresh drinks.

Cool Drinks and Summer Lovin’

Summer is synonymous with sun, and with the heat comes dreams of ripe strawberries and blueberries. Arguably one of the most versatile times of the year for the seasonal beverage, summer conjures cravings for the freshest of fruits, essentially removing all limits on the flavours associated with the season. Feel like a picnic? Break out the cherries, watermelons, and peaches! Perhaps you’re opting for a more tropical vibe? Mango, banana, and coconut are your go-to flavours.

Fall Into Flavour

In the recent years, it has become impossible to say Autumn and not immediately associate it with pumpkin spice. It would be resolutely objectionable if it weren’t so delicious! But pumpkin spice can’t exclusively claim the spotlight. Chai tea is the perfect blend of spices to bring warmth on a cool evening, and infusing it into cocktails gives it a little extra zing. By the same token, ciders are criminally underrated and Autumn is apple’s time to shine.

Mingle All The Way

In the coldest months of the year, it’s natural to want to warm up with some hot drinks, and that’s part of why Irish creme and butterscotch are two flavours that are so at home where it’s chilly. Not far behind, and workable in both cold and hot beverages, are pomegranate and vanilla. And it would be a terrible faux pas to neglect Christmas in our wintry equation. The festive favourite, eggnog can be worked into a variety of enticing cocktails.

Mix and Match Your Mixers

It’s important to remember that flavour is an extraordinarily versatile thing. Many flavours can not only cross over from season to season, but some work no matter what time of year it is.

Spring & Summer

Lemonade is a refreshing drink with a distinct tartness that plays well as a Spring or Summer mixer. Also zesty and flavourful, pineapple and grapefruit are both fruits called to mind when reflecting on the warmer months.

Autumn & Winter

As Autumn often carries into Winter quite quickly, their flavours can often do the same. The sweetness found in maple and caramel blend beautifully with both flavour profiles, making them easily interchangeable. And though the weather may not be optimal for fruit harvesting, cranberries and pears are regularly seen on each season’s menu.

Winter & Spring

Though it may seem odd that any flavour compatible with Winter might relate to Spring’s more colourful palette, a few tastes do cross over that strange boundary. Mint, whether spearmint (more closely associated with Spring) or peppermint (very obviously linked to Winter – and, of course, Christmas), marries brilliantly in both season’s menu. Ginger is another flavour that can bridge the gap. Regular ginger is light enough to accompany Spring’s breezy tastes, while ginger’s more spicy notes build solid foundations for robust drinks in Winter.

The Full 365

When in doubt, there are some items you can easily work into a drink menu no matter the date. Coffee and tea are universal after dinner refreshments, but dependent on their serving temperature and additions, they can make for distinctive cocktails or a unique digestif.

All the Bells and Whistles

Believe it or not, even garnishes are often used seasonally. Basil, thyme, rosemary, elderflower, and lavender tend to be reserved for the more temperate months, whereas cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon sticks, and allspice bring a kick to the cocktails of the cooler climates.

And of course, there are the classics with which you can do no wrong. Feel free to utilize these at any time of year: lemon, lime, or orange twists, and frozen or skewered berries.