Mexican-style Christmas Punch
This a delicious and sweet punch that will leave your house smelling like Chirstmas!
Growing up my paternal grandmother made this very popular Christmas punch every Christmas Eve. When I made the recipe, it brought me back memories of her family gatherings during the holidays! As you may know, Christmas is my favorite holiday and I am so excited to share with you a taste of a Mexican Christmas! While this is a tiny taste of everything that goes into “Navidad” (Christmas), I hope you get to enjoy it as much as I did!
During the holidays, Hispanic and Asian stores carry all the ingredients below because they are a staple in most Hispanic homes! However, if you’re looking at making this punch in the off-holiday season, most of the ingredients can be found at any Hispanic store and even Amazon!
Ingredients:
All the ingredients washed and ready for the Ponche Mexicano!
1-gallon water
4 cinnamon sticks
1 pound of “tejocotes” or apple hawthorn*
1 piloncillo (if you can’t find it use 1 cup of dark brown sugar)
3 sugar canes, cut long sides in fourths
1/2 pound guavas*
1 1/2 cups apples, diced
1 cup pears, diced
1/2 cup raisins
3 sugar canes* (cut long ways in fourths)
1 cup tamarind**
3/4 cup prunes, chopped
Directions:
In a large pot pour 1 gallon of water on medium heat.
Add cinnamon sticks, piloncillo (brown sugar), and apple hawthorns. Let this simmer for 15 minutes or until the piloncillo is dissolved.
Add the sugar cane and stir for 10 minutes
Add diced apples, guavas, pears, raisins, prunes, and tamarind, and mix well.
Set your heat at low and cover your pot. Let this cook for 1 hour.
Once the apples are soft, this is ready to serve.
When serving make sure you serve with the fruit. Also, this drink is often spiked with rum, I used Captain Morgan to spike up my drink. If you’re planning on adding rum to your cup make sure you stir after adding rum.
Notes:
*You will find most of the ingredients at any Hispanic or Asian store. Some of the items like the tejocotes/apple hawthorns, guavas, sugar cane, and tamarind will be in the produce aisle. If you cannot find them or the store does not have them you can use the canned version of the apple hawthorns, guavas, and sugar cane just make sure you rinse them to remove some of the syrup, and for step 5 only simmer for 30 minutes instead of an hour. For this recipe, I used canned sugar cane and it worked perfectly!
**For the tamarinds, make sure you peel the shell of the tamarind. Here’s a video to show you how to do it!
How to peel a tamarind! Leave the veins as you see in the video, the veins will keep the tamarind’s shape and when eating watch out for the pit.
