Swedish glögg with rum

Glögg is the Swedish version of mulled wine and is immensely popular in December. My wife and I have been making our own for more than a decade, even before we left Sweden and could still buy it everywhere. Here in Canada, we still make it and bring it to different gatherings in winter and it is always well received. It makes a great going-away present. I wanted to share this Swedish glögg recipe for you all to enjoy.

Glögg

While the word glögg is derived from glödgat vin (“heated wine”), the popular drink might as well be named after glugg, glugg, glugg, the sound made when enjoying it in copious amounts (and this might be easier to remember for English speakers). This Swedish version of mulled wine is incredibly popular throughout December and especially around Christmas. Every year, ~2.5 million litres of alcoholic glögg are sold by Systembolaget (state-run alcohol monopoly), in addition to an unknown amount of homemade or non-alcoholic glögg sold by other vendors ​[1]​.

To make glögg, wine is prepared with warm spices like cloves, cinnamon, and cardamom in advance and then heated just before serving. The classic way to drink Swedish glögg is to add a few raisins and blanched almonds to your cup to snack on while sipping on the glögg. Ginger snap cookies also pair really well with Swedish glögg.

History of glögg

Spiced wine

Spiced wine has been around for a long time, maybe as long as we’ve been drinking wine in general. In Ancient Greece, Hippocrates (aka “the father of Western medicine”, 5th to 4th century BCE) would sometimes prescribe Hypocras to his patients ​[2]–[4]​. Named after himself, hypocras is a spiced wine that was thought to have medicinal properties ​[2]​. The drink remained popular for millennia. On the blog Cooking in the Archives, Nicosia relates the recipe below for Hypocras from 1660 (> 2,000 years after Hippocrates lived). The same cookbook also gives a version without cream but with rosemary flowers.

Take a gallon of wine, three ounces of cinamon, two ounces of slic’d ginger, a quarter of an ounce of cloves, an ounce of mace, twenty corns of pepper, an ounce of nutmegs, three pound of sugar, and two quarts of cream.

Robert May, The accomplisht cook, 1660, p. 261

Spiced wine was also popular in the Roman Empire where it often went under the name conditum paradoxum, which translates to “surprise spice” ​[5]​. Apicius, a Roman recipe collection from the 1st century CE gives a recipe for conditum paradoxum ​[6]​. The recipe calls for 3 parts honey to 1 part wine and is seasoned with pepper, bay leaves, saffron, and roasted and crushed date pits soaked in wine. The recipe also calls for mastich which is resin from a tree. Maybe the tree resin is the surprise spice. Enjoy cold.

A royal drink in Sweden

Spiced and warm alcoholic beverages have been consumed in Sweden for centuries ​[2], [7]–[10]​. The precursor word glödgat vin (heated wine) first appeared in print in 1609 while the word glögg itself appeared in 1828 ​[7], [8]​. Glögg likely came to Sweden from German Glühwein and French bruleau or brûlot (cognac and sugar lit on fire) in the 16th century ​[7], [9]​. Gustav Vasa, one of Sweden’s most famous kings, listed glögg as his favourite beverage. At his son Erik XIV’s coronation, some 500 litres of lutendrank, a similar drink made from wine, milk and species, was served.

A living recipe

The recipe for glögg has evolved over the centuries with a few constants: alcohol, heat and spices. Often wine is involved but some versions only use hard liquor, like schnapps or vodka. For instance, a recipe in the newspaper Svenska Dagbladet calls for heating schnapps with spices and then pouring some of it over a sugar cone on a grid above the pot and lighting it on fire. The burning sugar will drip into the bowl, adding a sweet, caramel flavour ​[2]​. This version of glögg has fallen out of style in Sweden but a similar drink, Feuerzangenbowle, remains alive and active in German tradition ​[11]​.

Older glögg versions sometimes included milk as well as wine and the spices used have varied. Today, glögg is usually spiced with a combination of cloves, ginger, cardamom, cinnamon, and often citrus and maybe black pepper or allspice ​[1], [2]​. In the past, other spices like mace, vanilla, and licorice root have been used ​[10]​.

Glögg today

Glögg’s flavour evolution is not over. While most glögg makers might do some minor tweaking to the classic recipes – Should I add allspice? How many cloves are perfect? – the company Blossa releases a Glögg of the Year with vastly different flavours. Some flavours work better than others but many households enjoy testing the new Glögg, only available for a year. Blossa 22 is inspired by New Orleans and includes passionfruit, rum, strawberries and chili ​[12]​ while past flavours have included lingonberries and juniper berries (2006), saffron (2010), mango, cumin and chili (2017) or Earl Grey and bergamot (2015) ​[13]​.

Cold glögg drinks

And if you for some reason were to tire of warm glögg, you can spice things up and mix a glögg cocktail and serve at your next dinner party. Mix some cold wine glögg with prosecco and serve up a sparkling apéritif ​[14], [15]​, prepare a can of Christmas sangria ​[16]​ or why not a glögg martini with gin and glasses frosted with cinnamon ​[17]​.

Non-alcoholic glögg

Non-alcoholic glögg is also very popular. You can drink more of them and they are often served to children, so they can be part of our traditions as well. You can make your own non-alcoholic glögg by simmering spices straight in a tart fruit juice, such as cranberry juice or black currant lemonade. Another option is to make sorrel, the Trinidadian recipe I posted here two years ago. To make sorrel the drink, spices are simmered along with dried hibiscus flowers (sorrel). The hibiscus flowers add a deep red colour and a very tart flavour so adding a few spoons of sugar is adviced.

Glögg in other countries

Sweden is not alone in drinking glögg in the winter darkness. It is also a popular drink in other Nordic countries, Denmark, Norway, Finland, and Iceland ​[8]​. The recipes appear to be the same as the Swedish glögg recipes (which, to be fair, vary greatly). In Denmark, the glögg is often served with æbleskiver, the spherical pancakes we made for our visit to Denmark earlier this year.

Swedish glögg recipe

The recipe I share below is a recipe my wife and I have been using since 2010 and we continue to make it year after year. After having had storebought white wine glögg with rum, we wanted to make our own. We originally found a recipe on a small grocery store website (vi butikerna) but this website appears to have vanished soon after we found it. Luckily we wrote down the recipe. Over the years, the recipe has drifted a bit but it is still a very simple and potent recipe.

Spice extraction

To make your own glögg, one of the key steps is to get the flavour out of the spices and into the liquid. The recipe below uses a strong alcohol such as rum to extract flavour from the spices. This is a very simple and effective way (alcohol is a great solvent). Another method is to simmer the spices in water and sugar to create a glögg essence that is then added to wine, creating a less alcoholic version. You can also heat the wine gently and add the spices directly to it and then let them steep for a long time but I find this to impart less flavour.

Citrus

The spices used in the recipe are easy to find except for when it comes to the dried citrus. In Sweden, we use the dried peel of bitter orange which can be found everywhere. But here in Canada, I could only find it online in a brewery shop. Instead, I have been experimenting with buying dried orange peel in Chinese stores but I found it too sweet. This year, I tried dried limes of the kind you find in Persian or Omani cooking. This works quite well. You can also use fresh orange peel, as you do when making Trinidadian sorrel.

Conclusion

This is a recipe my wife and I have been using since 2010 and we continue to make it year after year. Wherever we bring our glögg, it is met with great success. If you like mulled wine and Glühwein, you should definitely try this recipe this winter. It is a great drink to bring to gatherings and as a going-away present and it is very straightforward to make.

Swedish glögg recipe

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Swedish glögg with rum

Course Drinks

Cuisine Nordic, Northern Europe, Scandinavian

Keyword Alcohol, Christmas, holiday

Prep Time 5 minutes minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes minutes

Infusion 1 day day

Ingredients

• 2 pcs dried ginger
• 5 cloves
• 5 green cardamom pods
• 2 pcs cinnamon
• 1 pcs dried citrus See note
• 200 mL rum or other strong alcohol See note
• 2 bottles wine See note
• port, optional See note
• 150 mL sugar, or to taste

For serving

• blanched almonds
• raisins

Instructions

• Add all spices to a glass jar and cover with the rum or other strong alcohol.
• Let sit for 24 or more hours. A few days are also fine.
• Strain the out the spices and discard.
• Mix the infused alcohol with wine and sugar. Let sit until the sugar has dissolved, 20-30 min.
• The glögg is now ready.

For serving

• Add glögg to a pot and heat on the stove at a medium temperature. The glögg should start steaming. Stop heating when small bubbles start to appear.

  Only heat as much as you want to consume.
• Pour into small cups and serve immediately.
• A few almonds and raisins can be added to each cup and eaten with a spoon while enjoying the glögg.

Notes

Dried citrus: In Sweden, dried bitter orange peel is often added to glögg but I have found it hard to find here in Canada. Instead, I have tested dried sweet orange peel from a Chinese grocery store. This year, I used dried limes from West Asian cuisine. You can also try fresh citrus peel.

Strong alcohol: We usually use rum and sometimes whiskey. You can also use vodka for a more neutral taste or try cognac or brandy. The main function of the strong alcohol is to extract flavour from the spices.

Wine: You can use red or white wine. A dry wine is preferable but not essential.

Port: some recipes add a dash of sweet dessert wine such as port or Madeira to add a bit of richness.

 

References