By the time November settles in, the spritz might seem like a drink you packed away with the patio furniture. It deserves a second season. A spritz is a tall, bubbly, Italian-style drink, traditionally built on sparkling wine, soda water, and something lightly bitter, and the format takes surprisingly well to cold-weather flavors. This winter mocktail trades summery brightness for a homemade baking-spice syrup, so you get cinnamon, clove, and orange peel riding on top of all those bubbles.
The base can be as simple as soda water, but the drink is noticeably better with a dry non-alcoholic sparkling wine. Something like Lyre’s Classico Grande brings acidity and a wine-like edge that keeps the syrup from turning the whole glass into liquid pie. And to be honest about it up front: without alcohol, sweet drinks read even sweeter, so the lemon juice here is not optional. It is what makes this taste like a cocktail instead of a spiced soda.
Ingredients
For the baking-spice syrup (makes about 12 oz):
- 8 oz water
- 1 cup demerara or light brown sugar
- 2 cinnamon sticks, cracked
- 5 whole cloves
- 4 allspice berries, lightly crushed
- 1 star anise pod
- 3 wide strips of orange peel
- 3 coin-size slices of fresh ginger
For each spritz:
- 0.75 oz baking-spice syrup
- 0.5 oz fresh lemon juice
- 3 oz chilled dry non-alcoholic sparkling wine
- 1 oz soda water
- Orange half-wheel and a cinnamon stick, for garnish
Instructions
- Make the syrup. Combine the water, sugar, spices, orange peel, and ginger in a small saucepan. Bring to a gentle simmer and stir until the sugar dissolves, then let it bubble quietly for about 5 minutes.
- Pull the pan off the heat and steep for 20 to 30 minutes, tasting as you go. When the cinnamon and clove are clearly present but not medicinal, strain into a jar. It keeps refrigerated for about two weeks.
- Fill a large wine glass with ice.
- Add the syrup and lemon juice and give them a quick stir to combine.
- Top with the sparkling wine, then the soda water, and stir once, gently, just enough to lift the syrup off the bottom without flattening the bubbles.
- Garnish with the orange half-wheel and the cinnamon stick.
Variations
Make it bitter. A classic spritz has a bitter backbone, and this one welcomes it. Add an ounce of a non-alcoholic aperitivo (an aperitivo is a lightly bitter drink meant for before dinner) and cut the syrup back to 0.5 oz. Ghia works nicely here, and the spiced options from Little Saints lean into the same warm-spice territory as the syrup.
Cranberry version. Swap the soda water for 1 oz of unsweetened cranberry juice and drop the lemon to 0.25 oz. The color alone earns it a spot at Thanksgiving.
Chai shortcut. No whole spices in the house? Steep two chai tea bags in the hot sugar and water instead. The result is a little more tannic, which actually helps the drink feel drier.
Final Thoughts
This is an easy drink to batch. Multiply the syrup and lemon juice by the number of guests, stir that mixture in a pitcher, and add the sparkling wine and soda glass by glass so nobody gets a flat pour. The syrup also moonlights in coffee, hot cider, and over oatmeal, so nothing goes to waste.
If you want a second winter mocktail in the rotation, our Winter Citrus Sparkler covers the brighter end of the season. Between the two, you have the cozy glass and the crisp one, and December tends to call for both.