We love to find out new ways of serving our favourite sparkling wine and were smitten by this Prosecco and ginger aperitivo when we tasted it in Rome at Christmas time. Of course ginger is a powerful aphrodisiac, warming up the body and increasing your heart rate just like chilli! Valentines drinks anyone?!

Ingredients

For the ginger syrup:

8cm piece of fresh ginger, peeled and thinly sliced

110g raw cane sugar or granulated sugar

Alt="vorrei italian ginger"

1 bottle of Prosecco

Lime or orange to garnish

Method

Bring the ginger, sugar and half a cup of water to boil in a small saucepan, reduce the heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Leave to cool. Strain the syrup through a fine sieve into a small jar or bowl, discard the ginger.

The syrup can be made up to a week ahead and stored in the fridge (covered).

Pour some ginger syrup (around 10ml) into each glass and top up with ice cold Prosecco, garnish with a slice of lime or orange.

Enjoy!