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Mike's Mix: Camping Cocktails

As we get closer to summer and the weather gets warmer, more and more people are breaking out the tent and heading to the woods. Mike Augustyniak has three cocktails that are perfect for sitting around the campfire.

Shrub in the Scrub

Ingredients
2 cups Tattersall Gin
1 ½ cups raspberry shrub*
½ cup water

Directions

Mix all ingredients together and keep in freezer in a travel friendly container until you leave to camp. Keep cocktail in a cooler until ready to serve. Pour over ice.

*To make raspberry shrub:

Mix 2 cups of frozen raspberries and 2 cups of water in a pot and bring to a boil. Let simmer for 10 minutes. Blend in a blender and strain (the straining takes a little time and patience as raspberries have a lot of seeds and contain pectin). Return strained juice to the stove and bring to boil with 2 cups of sugar. Simmer until the sugar has dissolved. Mix in 1/8 cup of rice wine vinegar and let cool. When refrigerated in a clean container this should last for weeks.

Taste Test

This quick-and-easy punch can be made weeks ahead and stored in the freezer before your trek; it doubles as a cooler pack to help keep your other perishables cold! The raspberry shrub is on the sweeter side, so the rice wine vinegar is a must to balance out the flavor. It also helps to serve the final product over ice, to help with dilution. You could also add some chilled club soda, if you choose.

Recipe courtesy of Adam Gorski: http://drinktruepenny.com

Glamping Punch

Ingredients

750mL Basil Hayden's bourbon
750mL Brut sparkling wine
Grapefruit oleo saccharum*
Pu-erh tea base**
2 cups water
2 cups grapefruit juice

Directions

Juice peeled grapefruit.  Mix tea base and oleo saccharum together and strain out solids. Add all ingredients to punch bowl with large block of ice. Stir briefly to chill, dilute and incorporate ingredients.

*To make grapefruit oleo saccharum:

3 medium sized Ruby Red grapefruit
½ cup sugar

Peel grapefruit with vegetable peeler or Y peeler, being careful to remove as little pith as possible. Add peels to glass bowl, don't use plastic or metal. Add sugar to bowl and muddle slightly. Let sit for one to two hours, stirring occasionally.

** To make pu-erh tea base:

3 cups water
2 tablespoons Schezuan peppercorn
2 tablespoons green cardamom pods
7 star anise
5 grams pu-erh tea

Bring water to boil and add all ingredients except tea. Boil for five minutes and remove from heat. Let steep until room temperature. Strain spices from liquid and bring liquid to 205-210 degrees. Remove from heat and add tea and steep until room temperature. Strain tea leaves. Should yield about 2 cups.

Taste Test

If the Shrub in the Scrub is a VW Beetle, this is the Jaguar of punches. This cocktail from bartender and Beam Suntory Luxury Specialist (his title; not mine!) makes use of a lower-proof bourbon, sparkling wine and a mix of bright grapefruit and earthy, funky tea notes. The result is an effervescent punch, suitable for a group, that's light and refreshing even in the heat.

White Sangria

Ingredients

2 cups Copper & Kings immature brandy
2 bottles (1.5L total) dry white wine
1 cup chopped fresh mango
1 cup chopped fresh pineapple
1 cup strawberries
1 cup blueberries

Directions

Combine all ingredients in a large container, and allow to steep in the refrigerator for at least eight hours, but no more than 48 hours. Serve in an ice-filled glass

Taste Test

The beauty of sangria is that it serves a large group, for relatively little cost, and can make use of whatever you have on hand. The fruit in this recipe is interchangeable for any other fruit you might have; the wine should be drinkable, but cheap (around $8/bottle is fine). This is a drier sangria, and if that's not to your liking, you can add simple syrup to taste.

For more sangria recipes, click here.

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