A New Year’s Party requires a special cocktail, complete with lots of bubbles. New Year’s Eve is all about the champagne, so if you’re making a cocktail, you better make it a champagne cocktail, which is exactly what I did when I made my Plum Sparkler. If you spent your fall packing fruit into brandy, like I did, a New Year’s Party is definitely an occasion that warrants cracking open one of those extra special jars. But if you didn’t, you should be able to find plum brandy at a good liquor store; just ask for Slivovitz or Slivovitsa. Believe it or not, plum brandy made from Damson plums is very popular in Eastern Europe. Of course it won’t take exactly the same as this homemade hooch based drink, but that’s a big part of the fun in mixology in my humble opinion. This cocktail has lots of sweetness to it, but the soda and sparkling wine balance it out perfectly. Just make sure to buy a brut sparkling wine to ensure this cocktail doesn’t get too sweet. You can always adjust the sweetness up and down by adding more or less of the lillet blanc and orange liquor. The … Continue reading →