For Unforgettable Sangria, Add A Packet Of This Drink Mix

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Sangria is most often a festive summer drink, but it can also turn get-togethers into celebrations year-round. Traditional sangria is made with red wine blended with a variety of fruit, fruit juice, and sugar; but the drink is versatile, which means the recipe can be adjusted to suit your favorite flavors. To make an extra-fruity sangria, consider mixing in an uncommon ingredient you might not have considered before: Kool-Aid.

As many of you know, Kool-Aid is a powdered punch mix sold in a pouch that's blended with sugar and water at home. Adding it instead to a wine-based fruit punch is a novel idea which sangria purists can approach as an experiment. When thinking about which variety of wine is best for sangria, people are often tempted to purchase a quality Spanish red. However, an inexpensive wine is often a better choice since you'll be loading it up with flavorful ingredients that will inevitably cover up the subtle flavors of a fine wine. I chose a private-label, budget-friendly red wine I thought would be accommodating to all of the extra sweetness of the fruit, sugar, and drink mix, then proceeded to make a punchy sangria Kool-Aid. Here's how it turned out.

The process of making sangria is pretty straightforward, and you can try a variety of sliced fruits to alter the flavor. You're not stuck with what I used here. To begin, I used a technique that some experts consider the right way to make sangria, but with the idea of enhancing it with Kool-Aid. I chose a fairly conventional red sangria recipe and cut it in half, rendering four servings of red Kool-Aid sangria. The mix included ½ a bottle of Charles Shaw Merlot; ½ each of a naval orange, lime, lemon, and pink lady apple sliced into ¼-inch-wide half-circles with the rind and skin intact; a 1:3 ratio of cane sugar to ½ cup orange juice; a dash of rum to taste (optional); and 1 package of powdered Kool-Aid Tropical Punch.

Start by mixing the sugar, orange juice, and rum in a serving pitcher until dissolved, then add all of the sliced fruit and muddle them with a cocktail muddler to release their juices. Add the wine and the Kool-Aid, mix things together, then set it in the fridge to let everything marinate for a couple of hours. If you're in a rush for time, you could start with a good store-bought sangria and add the Kool-Aid pouch, but making it yourself grants you more control over the flavor profile. It's worth noting that I needed to add more sugar after it was done marinating, so feel free to adjust the sweetness as needed based on the flavor of your finished sangria.

Initially, the sangria was very fruit-forward with a touch of tartness because I used less sugar than it needed. To adjust it, I mixed in more sugar a little at a time until it dissolved and the flavor leveled out to a wonderfully robust, wine-and-fresh-grape character with notes of citrus and tropical fruit from the Kool-Aid. There was also a pleasant little kick from the rum. Overall, it was very pleasing to drink.

If I were to mix a Kool-Aid sangria again I would do it slightly differently by using a ratio of sugar closer to the amount suggested on the Kool-Aid package adjusted for how much sangria I planned to blend. (I initially added the amount of sugar called for in the sangria recipe.) However, if you'd prefer to adjust the sugar to taste like I did, you can start with less and add more as you see fit. After adjusting the sweetness, this sangria sang!

In addition to adding Kool-Aid, you might consider other ways to enhance your sangria recipe, such as including muddled mint leaves or adding a different liquor, such as brandy (or no liquor at all). You could then top it off with apple cider, your favorite seltzer, or sparkling water for some fizz.