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Friends, as you start to collect ideas for your Thanksgiving feast this year, please don’t forget the drinks! It’s an area I often overlook because sophisticated drinks tend to take quite a bit of time to pull together, not to mention the fact that I’ll be ingesting plenty of calories on Thanksgiving Day, so I’d rather limit the calories I add by way of a drink.
Do you feel similarly? If so, I want to encourage you to think about offering a different option this year to your guests (or if you are a guest, offering to take this on for the host and hostess!). I have created a special mocktail that I think is just perfect for Thanksgiving. It will wow your crowd without taking much of your time, and it’s free of alcohol! Additionally, since I’m using a TEN™ soda variety (which only have 10 calories per serving) you can trust that nobody will get too full from the drink alone.
Holiday Spiced 7UP TEN® Drink
Serves: 4 (easily can be doubled or tripled, though!)
Ingredients:
- (1) 2-liter bottle 7UP TEN®
- 1/2 cup water
- 1/4 cup honey
- 1 small container whole star anise
- 1 small container whole pink peppercorns
- 2 lemons
- several sprigs of fresh thyme
Instructions:
Heat 4 star anise and a heaping tablespoon of pink peppercorns over medium-high heat in a small saucepan for 3 minutes, stirring often. Use some of your broken star anise for this part of the recipe and save your fully intact pieces for later!
Now reduce the heat to medium and add the water to the pan and allow the water to reduce roughly by half. This took 5 minutes for me.
Remove the liquid from the heat and then remove the peppercorns and star anise either with a strainer or a slotted spoon. Now add the honey and stir until the honey is completely mixed with the water. This took about 30 seconds for me.
Once the honey and water are well combined, pour the simple syrup you just made into a container, and add a sprig of thyme to it.
At this time you should also add roughly 1 Tbsp of lemon juice to the mixture.
Give it a good stir and allow it to cool down for a few minutes. Remove the sprig of thyme prior to serving.
To the bottom of each glass, add 2 Tbsp of the honey mixture. Then add a few ice cubes, and fill the remainder of the way with 7UP TEN®. Garnish each drink with a slice of lemon on the rim, a sprinkle of pink peppercorns, 1 whole star anise, and a few sprigs of thyme.
Isn’t it festive?! And if the adults at your gathering would strongly prefer an alcoholic beverage, a dash of whiskey will compliment the drink quite well, I assure you. 😉
I hope you love the great taste of this spiced holiday drink, and I hope the crowd you serve it to is dazzled by its beauty, and overjoyed by its humble calorie count thanks to 7UP TEN®. Cheers!
Coupon Alert!
Great news, friends! Now you can save $1 on TWO (2) 2-Liter bottles of 7UP TEN®, A&W TEN®, Canada Dry TEN®, RC TEN®, Squirt TEN™, or Sunkist® TEN™ You can find the savings here. A great place to pick them up is your nearest Walmart. I found several TEN products on the shelves when I was there earlier this week.
Don’t forget to vote for your favorite TEN recipe and check out these awesome beverage recipes to get more great ideas. Which one would you most like to serve at your holiday gathering?