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Outdoor Friendly: The White Port Cocktail

Written by Madeline Puckette

White Port Cocktail Recipe

White Port Cocktail at the Yeatman Hotel Vila Nova de Gaia
The night is at your fingertips. Photo taken at the Yeatman Hotel overlooking Porto.
We discovered this cocktail in Portugal! White Port makes a great addition to your cocktail arsenal.

  • 1 part White Port
  • 1 part Tonic Water
  • a twist of orange or an orange wedge

Pour White Port over ice, add tonic and straw. Add orange to garnish, drink and repeat.

Modifications
  • Muddled mint
  • Substitute lemon for orange
  • Aromatize wine for winter with clove & cinnamon
  • Substitute soda and bitters for tonic

 

This is how they do it in Portugal

We asked a few bartenders in Porto what the proper mixture of port and tonic was. Most bars and cafes pour one serving of Port (90 ml or 3 ounces) into a glass of ice and hand you a small bottle of tonic to pour over at your own discretion.

A Classic Portuguese Cocktail

White Port & Tonic

Port Cocktail with Churchills Dry White Port and Schweppes Tonic
In Portugal, Port wine is served everywhere, even at nightclubs. They don’t use the rich,
tooth-staining red Port wine. Instead, the dance-all-night Port cocktail calls for White Port. Produced in the same manner as Port, White Port is made from white wine grapes in the Douro Region of Portugal (ever heard of Viosinho, Malvasia or Rabigato? Gold star!). White Ports are available both sweet and dry and for the cocktail below we used a Dry White Port.


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Written byMadeline Puckette

James Beard Award-winning author and Wine Communicator of the Year. I co-founded Wine Folly to help people learn about wine. @WineFolly


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