Holiday entertaining, you either love it or you don’t. And I love it! Well, I love it now that I understand how to do it with low stress. For me this means being able to prep out my food and drinks in advance and understanding that it doesn’t have to be perfect. We have all experienced having people over and then you are stuck in the kitchen last minute pulling everything together while you are missing out on visiting with your guests. So I am here to give you a very simple, yet delicious and easy to make Spiced Pear Martini!

I made this martini in partnership with The Hangar 1 Distillery, which is the smoothest vodka I have ever tried. Mixed with some pear juice and a home made spiced simple syrup. This can all be done in advance in a pretty punch bowl or cool serving glass bottles. When guests arrive, simply fill their glasses, top with prosecco, and add an easy garnish.

We also discovered that any leftover Spiced Pear Martini blend works perfectly warmed up and drank by the fire, just skip the prosecco.

Spiced Pear Martini
Makes 4

INGREDIENTS
2 cups pear juice
1 cup vodka
2 ounces spiced simple syrup (this can be purchased, or made easily made at home)
6 ounces prosecco

For Garnish:
Pear Slices
Spices (cinnamon stick, cloves, cardamom, pinch of nutmeg)

Spiced Simple Syrup*
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 whole orange, peel
3 tablespoons peeled, freshly grated ginger
3 cinnamon sticks
4 whole cloves
3 cardamom pods
Pinch of nutmeg

Simple Syrup STEPS
Bring 2 cups of water and sugar to a boil, add orange peel, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, cardamom and nutmeg. Stirring until sugar dissolves. Reduce heat, and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from heat, cover and let steep and cool for up to one hour. Strain, and refrigerate until cold.

Use this Spiced Simple Syrup as a guide. This is my favorite combination, but also works well with simply using cinnamon, orange peel and nutmeg. Choose your favorites, if not all of them.

Spiced Pear Martini STEPS
Now because this is a batch style recipe, and we are talking Holidays, this is how I like to serve and prepare drinks for a crowd. Low stress and beautiful presentation is my key to successful entertaining!

I like to use glass liter bottles that have the flip tops. But you can also use a beautiful glass pitcher, or even a punch bowl if you would like.

Fill your bottle (using a funnel if you have a narrow opening), with pear juice, vodka, and simple syrup. Give it a shake, and now store in the fridge until nice and chilled. If you are low on time, put it in the freezer on ice.

Before the guests arrive, make sure you have your martini glasses chilling in the freezer.

To serve, garnish each chilled martini glass with a thinly sliced pear, divide up the Spiced Pear Martini amongst 4 glasses, and top each glass with 1.5 ounces chilled Prosecco. For extra garnish, add some of the spiced ingredients.