The Sedler Version of a Hot Toddy

       On Sunday we had a little family gathering for dinner, decorating cookies and watching the Patriots game, which by the way had an epic ending! My sister and her boyfriend Matt came over and had the great idea of making some hot cider with cinnamon sticks...

And we spiked it, of course...

     They got the Kraken rum out of curiosity, because lets be honest, the label and the bottle itself look pretty badass. I mean it says "bizarre and fierce sea creatures as seen through the eyes of the imagination" and I'm 90% sure that little quote is was hooked them. Good thing though, because it tasted pretty darn good with the cider. 

      Sipping on one of these delicious drinks and watching football at home on Sunday with my family is a great way to spend the day. Not to mention the cookie decorating was pretty entertaining...

    That's my cute little mom making icing and my brother showing off his masterpiece. I'm assuming it's supposed to be a pumpkin but you really can never be 100% sure. His focus lies more in eating than in decorating, and its difficult to see what it is when it's half gone.....

     We iced cookies in the shapes of leaves, suns and pumpkins in a whole array of fall colors. We learned in that process that if you don't have a brown food coloring for icing (which I'm not sure if that even exists, so you probably don't) then just use cocoa powder, or in our case which we didn't have that either, Ovaltine. Seems kinda funny, but it worked great!

    The cider recipe is extremely simple and a great drink for the fall season. Sweet and spicy and delicious!

    You can use any kind of spiced rum, but I really liked the Kraken. It has a nice vanilla-y aroma and the spice goes great with the cider. I personally am not a fan at all of Captain Morgan's so that would definitely not be my first choice!

    We were calling them Hot Toddies all night, until we pointed out that that's not really what a hot toddy actually is - it's hot water with lemon, honey, whiskey and a cinnamon stick... Close enough. So this is the Sedler version of a hot toddy. I guess I'll have to try the real one sometime and post that recipe, so I'll call this drink by what it is. Spiced Rum Cinnamon Cider :) Yumm!

Hot Spiced Rum Cinnamon Cider

Ingredients:

1 cup cider per drink

1 shot Kraken rum per drink

2 cinnamon sticks per five cups cider (plus more if you want to stick one in each individual drink)

Directions:

In saucepan over stove, heat cider with cinnamon sticks and pour in rum 

(do not boil or simmer) 

Keep hot to serve