Sweet, refreshing, and bubbly, these DIY Flavored Bellinis are the perfect drink to wash down a scrumptious brunch - or really anything.
Article courtesy of: Tina, Just Putzing Around the Kitchen
As a kid, my favorite part of Easter was the Easter egg hunt – finding as many plastic eggs as I could, cracking them open, then devouring all the goodies inside. As an adult, I still love Easter candy (and will definitely be hitting up CVS for discounted chocolate next week), but my new favorite thing to do on Easter is go to brunch. Brunch on Easter is a thing, isn’t it? People go to church early in the morning then head to brunch? Right? Right.
Dan and I aren’t church-goers, but we are big-time brunch-goers, Easter or no Easter. Love the food, love the time frame, love the atmosphere. There are few pleasures in life I love more than rolling out of bed late on a lazy weekend, hitting up our favorite local brunch joint, and diving into a plate of runny eggs and bacon. And, if there’s some kind of bottomless drink special on offer, count us in. Pass the mimosas and bellinis, hold the Blood Mary’s (clam juice and tabasco – yuck).
Dan’s a big fan of orange juice, so he’s all about the mimosas. I would never say no to a mimosa, but if given a choice, I tend to gravitate more towards bellinis. Peaches are delicious and peaches + Prosecco/sparkling wine is even more delicious. Which is why when I saw How Sweet It Is’s DIY bellini bar post last week, I was all OMG WHAT IS THAT I WANT IT NOW. So this morning I hauled my lazy ass out of bed well before noon (this is more rare than I care to admit) and started pureeing fruits. At first Dan was all “why are you out of bed so early making a racket,” but then I fed him a piece of bacon and he subsided. Men, they’re easy. Just like these bellinis!
If we’re being technical, a bellini is supposed to be made with pureed peaches or peach nectar. But I don’t see why you couldn’t use other fruits. It’s a free country, y’all! For her bellini bar, How Sweet It Is used pineapple, cantaloupe, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, kiwi, mangoes and watermelon. I wasn’t throwing a party (and I only had 4 mini-carafes, which I had my heart set on using for these photos), so I settled on 4 fruits: peach, kiwi, strawberry, and blackberry. This would give me both a nice variety of flavors and colors.
The bellinis were, of course, delicious. How could they not be? Sweet, refreshing, and bubbly, they were the perfect drink to wash down our pre-Easter brunch of popovers and bacon. Going into the experiment, I was afraid the flavors of fruit in each bellini would be overwhelmed by the tart bubbliness of the Prosecco, but luckily that didn’t happen. Each bellini tasted uniquely fruity and delicious, and Dan and I enjoyed them all. A lot. It’s possible we enjoyed them a little too much, actually. Naps are definitely in order. That’s an Easter thing too, right?
Happy Easter, everyone!
DIY Flavored Bellinis
Ingredients
- 1 to 2 cups fruit of your choice (I used strawberries, kiwis, peaches, and blackberries)
- 1 bottle prosecco
- Simple syrup (1 cup water + 1 cup sugar, simmered without stirring over medium heat until sugar is dissolved. Allow to cool before using)
Instructions
- Make each of your fruit purees separately. For example, start with the strawberries. Add the strawberries to your blender and blend until pureed. Taste the puree to test its tartness, then add in 1 or 2 oz of simple syrup (depending on how sweet you want it, or how water-dense your fruit is – FYI, my blackberries needed more syrup/water than my strawberries b/c the puree was thicker and more tart) and blend again.
- Pour completed mixture into a glass or jar, and set aside.
- Rinse your blender and repeat with the next fruit.
- Store the fruit purees in the fridge until you are ready to serve. (Shake or stir the puree if it begins to separate)
- To serve the bellinis, add some fruit puree (as much as you want) into the bottom of a champagne flute.
- Top it off with prosecco, stir, and serve.
- Enjoy!
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