Did you know a wine slushy is different from frosé? I know what you’re thinking: you say tom-ay-toe, I say tom-ah-toe. But, really. There’s a subtle difference between the two. According to the blog, Let It Wine, “frosé requires these basic ingredients – a bottle of rosé, sugar, and lemon juice. A slushie requires these basic ingredients wine, fruit, sugar.” The other subtle difference is that the “wine slushie seems to have a higher ratio of fruit to wine…making this more of a blended frozen sangria.” Frosé on the other hand is typically more wine-forward.
Whichever frozen deliciousness you choose, you have to admit that this wine cocktail is a 100% delicious trend. And apparently, most of America agrees with me because the year frozen wine cocktails, became a thing, rosé sales actually doubled people drank them so much. How wild is that? An entire genre of wine 2x’ed its sales because someone had the genius idea to add ice.
Even wilder is that frosé was just a happy viral accident by a cute, small Italian restaurant in New York. In 2016, Justin Sievers, the restaurant’s general manager, and his team knew a balmy New York summer was approaching. That meant a whole season where guests would inevitably request glass after glass of chilled wine. With a bit of laugh, they decided to see just how cold they could get their wine and threw a few bottles of Rosé into their slushy machine. The lore is that they posted a picture of the result on social media and the internet about exploded. One article claims the original post amassed “hundreds of thousands of likes, views, and over 50,000 shares.”
Now, years later, frosé and wine slushies have proven they’re here to stay with even the most mainstream restaurants boasting an annual assortment of frozen wine delights. As I’ve learned, however, not all recipes are created equal. I’ve carefully chosen this Amaro Frosé recipe we tried from the book Celebrate Rosé. One look at this beauty and you’ll see why this wine recipe has quickly become one of my favorites:
According to the former senior food editor of Bon Appetit, Rick Martinez, you’ll want to carefully choose which Rosé you use in any ice-blended wine cocktails. Your wine will lose a little flavor in this process so a full-bodied rosé made from pinot noir or merlot grapes, like our Lazy River Rosé, will maintain its great taste–and spare you from sipping on something that’s more akin to slushy wine water.
The Tidal Wave