Mulling Spices

Orange slices cut into 1/8-inch rounds

Every year I try to come up with a small, handmade gift for my colleagues. Previous years saw me making lavender soap and lavender bath salts and baking German "Weihnachtsstollen" (German Christmas stollen). What would it be this year? As I looked through old issues of various cooking magazines I came across a recipe for homemade mulling spices in the December 2012 issue of
Food & Wine.

Orange and ginger slices drying in the oven

Dried orange and ginger slices, cinnamon, cloves, star anise, black peppercorns and allspice berries

The ingredients seemed easy enough to find and I trusted my oven with drying the orange and ginger slices as described in the recipe. I decided to double the amount (so that one gift was enough for about 2 quarts of wine or apple cider) and to fill the mulling spices into clear cellophane bags.

Recipe: Mulling Spices - Food & Wine December 2012

Mulling Spices in clear cellophane bags

I won't be handing out my gifts until December 21, so in the meantime I have stored the spices and fruit in a cool, dark place. Once it's time to fill the bags, I will place "To Use" instructions into the bags, tie them shut, and attach a "From the Kitchen of " stamped gift tag to each bag.