Recipe: Strawberry Sangria Ice Pop Cocktails
This summer you should be putting boozy ice pops in your booze
While frozen wine slushies and cocktails will never go out of style in the summer months, we're all about the "poptail" at the moment. That's a boozy ice pop dropped into another form of boozy beverage, so as it melts, it infuses into the drink. Not only is the slowly melting popsicle like a sake bomb of fruity alcoholic goodness, but it's the perfect way to enjoy the season's favorite treat without it dripping all over your hands and clothes.
Around the country, boozy ice pops have become a refreshing alternative to frozen drinks to help beat the heat. Feverish Pops in Miami offers a line of spiked pops including mango bourbon and strawberry mojito. Meanwhile, at the King of Pops bar in Atlanta, you can drop a pop into any of its cocktails.
At the Loopy Doopy Rooftop Bar on top of the Conrad in NYC, you can order ice pop cocktails all summer. "We wanted to do something that hadn't been done before and would be a great refreshing summer cocktail," Max Harris, director of food and beverage at the hotel, tells us. When they started to get popular, Loopy Doopy paired up with NYC-based ice pop stand People's Pops to produce a wide variety of boozy ice pops for dropping into Prosecco or sparkling rosé.
"Our flavor profile for our standard boozy pop was intended like a cocktail: to have a beginning, middle and end to each flavor—a full spectrum of flavor," David Carrell, cofounder of People's Pops, explains.
In this exclusive recipe, fresh strawberries and peaches are puréed with Cabernet Sauvignon and hibiscus syrup before being frozen into pops and dropped into glasses of sparkling wine. The floral sweetness from the pop slowly melts into the wine, changing the flavor of the drink the longer it sits.
Any which way you choose to enjoy them, these drinks are pretty chill.
Check out our favorite frozen desserts.
Recipe adapted from People's Pops, New York, NY
- ½ cup light brown sugar
- ½ cup water
- 1 teaspoon dried hibiscus flowers
- ¾ pound strawberries, stemmed and hulled
- ¾ pound (2 large) yellow peaches
- 1 cup Cabernet Sauvignon
- 3 teaspoons dried cranberries
- Prosecco or sparkling rosé, for serving
- In a small saucepan, combine the brown sugar, water and hibiscus flowers over medium heat. Bring to a simmer and stir until the sugar has completely dissolved and the flowers have rehydrated, 3 minutes. Remove from the heat and let the mixture steep while it cools. Once cool, strain the syrup into a blender, discarding any solids.
- To the blender, add the remaining ingredients, except for the sparkling wine, and purée until smooth.
- Pour into ice pop molds and freeze until solid, 4 to 6 hours.
- Run the molds under room-temperature water for a few seconds to release them, then place each ice pop into a glass of Prosecco or sparkling rosé, and serve immediately.