Brr! It’s cold! What shall we drink?

Our weekend forecast is icy cold, and winter is just starting. So here’s a seasonal question: What do you like to drink when it’s freezing outside?

This is obviously an open-ended question. I didn’t even ask what wine you like to drink amid winter’s blasts, although that’s a good question, and we’ll get there soon.

Brr! It’s cold! What shall we drink?
What do you like to drink when it’s frosty outside?

But desperate times call for desperate measures, and icy weather can certainly make a case for a warming dram of high-proof distillates in wintry beverages like an Irish coffee, not to mention the more exotic delights of hot toddy,, a Tom and Jerry, or even the somewhat greasy experience of a hot buttered rum.

Cold-weather advice about Irish coffee from the friendly folks at Bushmills Irish whiskey: “Add a hearty pour of Bushmills Original to a warm cup of your favorite blend for a drink that’s so delicious, it’ll turn you into a morning person.”

Not ready for a shot of liquor on a chilly morning? All the non-alcoholic standards traditionally served hot are ready and waiting to warm your hands, your palate, and your sense of well-being. Hot coffee? Yes, please! Hot cocoa is a traditional winter pleasure – floating marshmallows are optional. There’s a range of hot teas for those who prefer, and don’t overlook the appeal of warmed apple juice or old-fashioned cider, with or without the alcohol.

All these good things can help banish the winter chill, but so, of course, can wine. Winter is traditionally the time to bring out our best red wines, particularly fuller-bodied, complex, reds, the Burgundies and Bordeaux and Barolos and top-shelf Tuscan reds, and all the other favored reds that we don’t really quit drinking over summer but perhaps appreciate all the more when snowdrifts are piling up ahead of bone-chilling winds outside.

And yet, when winter’s arrival coincides with the holiday season, my thoughts turn toward a more specific niche of the wine world: Fortified wines, those powerful, rich and hearty wines that warm us on winter nights and make us think of older times and characters in stories like Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.”

This wine style evolved centuries ago when producers, typically around the Mediterranean and Southern Europe, learned that adding a dose of brandy would help preserve wines destined for shipment, keeping the wines fresh and tasty during long sea voyages to Great Britain, the United States, and other destinations around the world. This fortification could also enhance flavor, and by halting fermentation before all the sugars had been converted to alcohol, produce lusciously sweet wines.

Port, Sherry, Madeira, and Marsala all represent this fortified style; and while they may address relatively niche markets, their popularity endures.

Today, I’m looking at Spain’s Sherry wine, and specifically its oaky, rich Oloroso style, as my candidate for sipping through this cold spell and the coming holidays.

Typically made dry but also available in sweeter variations, Oloroso is usually made from the region’s dominant Palomino Fino grape. Look for a bronze to brown color wine that, dry or sweet, will present rich, full-bodied, comforting, and yes, warming flavors focused on walnuts, stone fruit, and more subtle characteristics of caramel, coffee, and spice, with a sturdy base of 18% to 20% alcohol.

Today’s featured wine, Bodegas Lustau Oloroso Don Nuño Dry Sherry, is an exceptionally good example, highly recommended even at its retail price in the upper $20s in much of the U.S. (To locate possibly more affordable Olorosos, browse the vendor links at the bottom of the Oloroso page on Wine-Searcher.com.

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