Finnginn’s Favourite Festive Drinks: Number 8 - Buck’s Fizz

Like a once-beloved sitcom whose protagonists haven’t aged well, this blog likes to return for the Xmas Specials in the hope that some audience approval ratings and a favourable broadsheet review will mean getting greenlighted for a series in the new year. 

Last Advent, we probed the murkier depths of my Xmas music playlist for some forgotten and some best-forgotten Xmas classics. This year I’m dusting off my bartender’s tasting notes to review some of my favourite Xmas drinks. Feel free to drink responsibly along - and we’ll be including non-alcoholic alternatives for anyone who happens to be reading this blog whilst pregnant, driving, under age, hungover or just not in the mood for booze. 

As Jimmy Saville Dave Lee Travis might have been overheard saying in 1981: At Number 8: it’s Buck’s Fizz…

What is it?

Buck’s Fizz is a mixture of sparkling wine and orange juice. Get out your biggest jug, slowly pour in an entire bottle of bubbly and top up with OJ to taste. This is a great pre-breakfast drink for parents to drown out thoughts of over-commercialisation as they watch their kids tear the paper from the carefully thought out educational stocking fillers and cast them aside in favour of the selection box of Cadbury bars.  

Even if you can afford to drink Champagne, it seems a bit of a shame to be drowning an expensive bottle in a carton of ‘made from concentrate’. Far better to save the champers for toasting the Queen’s King’s Speech. If you can’t afford to toast with Champagne, Cremant is your friend here.

But for true value for money in your Buck’s Fizz (and naturally I’m ruling out those dreadful pre-mixed bottles here - we have standards on this blog) you’re going to want to get yourself a bottle or three of Lidl’s Arastel Cava Brut (currently priced around the £5.50 mark but frequently discounted in the build up to Xmas). I’m open to a sponsorship deal if anyone from Lidl wants to send me a case.

Then the trick is to up your Orange Juice game. Forget cartons, forget even the branded ‘not from concentrate’. Go out and source some large oranges and extract the juice from them. If you have one, you can use a juicer for this purpose. If you don’t have one - word to the wise - don’t buy your girlfriend one for Xmas.

(Before we were married, I thought it would be a good idea to buy my partner a juicer for Xmas one year. This turned out to be a terrible idea because a juicer comes in a big box. So naturally, she thought the giant wrapped box was secretly containing a little box with a diamond ring in it. Imagine her disappointment when the giant box actually contained a giant juicing machine! Still once a year, I dust it off to make the best damned Buck’s Fizz you’ll ever taste!)

Teetotal Alternative: St Clements

British readers will be familiar with the nursery rhyme that starts with the sweet refrain “Oranges and lemons say the bells of St Clements” and ends with the brutal beheading of a child by candlelight. This mocktail cleverly draws its name from the friendlier end of this rhyme and is a combination of equal parts: Schweppes Bitter Lemon and Orange Juice. 

What do you like to drink Xmas morning? Leave your comments below or on Facebook.

(Photo by Brooke Lark on Unsplash)