One time I was sailing in Greece, spending a week on a 50 ft yacht with a number of strangers, and one buddy Mr. V. – who normally is my chef when I am off sailing on my own boat. One of the other guests was from Portugal, and offered to make us a batch of authentic Sangria. It was of course delicious, but actually Sangria can have tons of sugar in it, and often uses a fortifier such as brandy, in addition to the wine.

The sugar, and the fortifier can help get you drunk a lot quicker than you can imagine, so Mr. V and I devised our own much simpler – and lighter version – it only requires three ingredients, so its much easier to source and prepare when off sailing or even camping etc.

Sailboat Sangria Recipe
1/3 red wine
1/3 Sprite or 7-Up
1/3 fruit juice (peach, apple, orange blends are great)
Mix and chill

You can add pieces of fruit, and ice (to do the chilling), and of course a sweetener such as sugar (white, brown, cane) and a fortifier such as brandy or rum) can be added if you have them, just do it to taste.

Recently when on a cruise boat in the Galapagos, Ecuador, we were treated to having both a chef on board, as well as our own bartender/server. It being the last night of our cruise, I talked them into making my Sailboat Sangria recipe as the “goodbye drink”, instead of serving something like wine. Our bartender came up with a a blend of juices, likely some Naranjilla (Little Orange), and some passion fruit in there, and then I did the simple 1/3 1/3 1/3 mix as above.

Wow – it was knock your socks off good, so I would encourage anyone trying this to devise their own juice blend.

Cheers Indeed!