Healthy Holiday Drinks You can Order at the Bar

 by Carrie Murphy Photo: Flickr user Pinguino  

 

We’ve all read those women’s magazine articles about how to order healthy drinks at the bar, which basically say: get a vodka tonic! We really can’t disagree (a vodka tonic is a relatively healthy drink, compared to other options) but it’s also pretty much a snooze when it comes to booze. To find somehealthy holiday drink ideas that aren’t totally boring, we went straight to the source and asked a few bartenders what they’d recommend. Here are their suggestions:

Say Yes To Fresh

Jacques Bezuidenhout, who is the Bartender Ambassador for Tequila 
Partida, gave me a couple basic rules of thumb for ordering drinks this holiday season:

Stay away from cheap liquors made with sugars and coloring. Stay away from store bought sweet & sours and mixers. As long as you use fresh ingredients, juice and use less sugars, your drinks will be low calorie. I like using agave nectar and honey.

Chef Marcus Guiliano, a chef who runs Aroma Thyme Bistro in the Hudson Valley, says that using fresh ingredients can also up your immunity, something that’s important during cold and flu season:

Any cocktail made with fresh squeezed juices will have a benefit versus cocktails made with pasteurized and sugared juices. For example fresh squeezed lime juice versus Rose’s Lime Juice.

It’s also a good rule of thumb to stay away from sugary drinks or brown liquors if you want to avoid a hangover (I wrote before about my terrible hangovers, but they’ve lessened quite a bit since I’ve limited myself to clear liquors). Vodka and gin generally have less calories than whiskey, bourbon, rum and other darker drinks, too.

Keep It Simple

Jesse Card, the master mixologist with Cruzan Rum, agrees that fresh ingredients are the key to healthy drinks: “If you take your favorite spirit and add it in with fresh squeezed juices and mixers, you can’t go wrong.”

And if you’re craving a drink that involves some holiday spice, he recommends keeping it simple:

“…as for the holidays/winter, another option can be as simple as asking for a hot toddy-style drink. Made with simple amounts of hot water, spices and a little something sweet into the mix, a toddy will warm you up and the water will actually help bring out more subtle flavors in your spirits. A win-win!

Sadly, it’s best to avoid the candy cane martinis and eggnog bombs if you don’t want to drink all your calories this holiday season. An eight-ounce eggnog with rum has an average of 370 calories, which can be a problem if you’d like to have more than one (also if you’d like to eat hors d’oeuvres, Christmas cookies and other seasonal treats).

Infused liquors (hello, peppermint and pumpkin!) would be a great choice for the holidays—that way, you can have your candy cane flavor but leave the hangover. Peppermint schnapps, that holdover from your high school days of raiding the liquor cabinet, is actually  a delicious addition to holiday boozing. It’s about 83 calories a serving and tastes great in hot chocolate.

 White wine is always a solid option (if, yes, a little bit boring). Champagne is more festive but it’s also relatively low-calorie (plus I always go directly into party mode when I drink it. Maybe not always a good thing, but always a fun thing!). Lighter beers and hard ciders are also not-so-bad options to order when you’re out celebrating.