The Greasy Spoon

Wassail

 

 

 

I've noticed that quite a few readers of The Greasy Spoon have been searching for wassail on the internet. As I'm feeling in a helpful mood, I'm revisiting a post that I wrote last year on the subject. I've also added a nice interactive link to a quirky short film I've found, explaining the wassail tradition in Herefordshire, England. Please take note of my own recipe for Mulled Cider. It's so utterly preferable to the ubiquitous Mulled Wine. I can't stress that enough.

Here's the article:

Wassail is a traditional mulled punch, drunk at Christmas-time in the Northern and Germanic countries. Very Nordic. Wassailing can either mean the singing of carols (at Christmas, the serfs would wassail the Lord and Lady of the Manor), or, as in Gloucestershire, and other western counties, the wassailing of an apple tree- to ensure a good harvest, and drive away the evil spirits. This is done on Twelfth Night. I reckon that The Wicker Man was closer to the bone than many people realise. 

Anyway, although I realise that the chances of wassailing an apple tree in down town Vancouver are practically zero, I'm going to give you my recipe for my very own wassail, otherwise known as Mulled Cider. I prefer it to Mulled Wine, I really do. The problem with the wine version, is that many people get it wrong. Very wrong. They chuck in a bottle of plonk, boil it up, and then add all sorts of other dodgy ingredients, including vodka; and the result is an over-acidic, pungent brew which can leave you with a god-awful hangover. 

Mulled Cider is "different", smoother- and in my opinion delicious. There are no rules; but to get the best results, I suggest that you keep it simple. In a large pan, I pour in a decent dryish West Country or Norman organic cider. Try and avoid the cheaper, sweeter, fizzy stuff.

Next, I cut an orange in half, and add that. Do the same with a lemon. Now it's time for the spices. A cinnamon stick, a few cloves, ground nutmeg, and a kernel of ginger would work well.Taste it!

If it's too dry, add a bit of brown sugar. Start warming it up. You do not want to boil it. Keep it simmering at just below boiling point. If you boil it, all the alcohol will vapourise away- and you want your party to go with a swing, don't you? If you're going to serve it in glass mugs, make sure that you put a silver spoon in the mug first. This will prevent the glass from shattering. 

If you've got time, decorate the wassail with "Lamb's Wool". This is just peeled apple simmered in cider until it goes woolly, and "explodes"; once that's done, you can float the pulp on top of the mulled cider.

 

 

Thrift and the Art of the Home Made

 

 

Do you remember the craze for home-made wine and beer?  Back in the 1970's it seems everyone was at it. Maybe it had something to do with the Real Ale, Beard and Sandals brigade- then, vaguely in fashion; but if I had to point a long finger at any root cause, it would be at the now forgotten concept of "thrift".  

This is something that we lost in the Eighties, Nineties and Naughties; but with the onslaught of the credit crunch (dreadful expression, that), I suspect is coming back into vogue. My father brewed his own beer and lager, and my poor mother had to put up with an evil-smelling red plastic bucket, which he kept in the kitchen cupboard (it was exactly the right temperature, apparently). Consequently, our hovel smelt like an outpost of Whitbread's.

Beer making was touchingly ritualistic: there was all the interesting paraphernalia you bought from Boot's, lots of "tut-tutting' over thermometers, and then the excitement of the first tasting. I seem to remember the lager tasted all right (if a bit soapy), but the bitter (how can I put this delicately, needed urgent revision.

Do it yourself wine making might be a noble and arcane rural pursuit worthy of re-discovery. A few years ago, I paid a visit to some Old Boy down in Stoke Poges- ostensibly to value his antique nick-knacks; but of a far greater interest were the dusty bottles lurking in his potting shed. Pigeon Fancying and Wine making were his hobbies- indeed his passions- and spurred on by my sudden enthusasiam, he urged me to sample his wares. Every bottle had been neatly labelled in a spidery handwriting, ready for tasting. Was Dandelion '73 better than Carrot '84? Was '92 a bad year for Cowslip?  Had he put too much sugar into the Elderflower "Champagne"? And so on, and so forth.

Now, I'm currently in a money pinching, tight-fisted mood, worthy of that shining example to us all: Ebeneezer Scrooge; and I salute the enterprise of Mr What Not of Stoke Poges. 

And on the same tack, what's happened to SodaStream? Those of us of a certain vintage will remember this well. Home-made tonic water, bitter lemon, and ersatz " cola" costing tuppence a shot. They seem to have a website going, though I don't know anyone whose got one.  And don't you have to get carbon di-oxide canister refills from somewhere? I'll have to investigate.

English Wine

 

 

English Wine? I can hear you all spluttering into your glasses of chilled Sancerre. But I'm not talking about British wine, or for that matter, British Sherry- I can remember the horrors of "Olde Sedgmoor"- a so called British sherry, made from sugar, water, and grape concentrate, mixed up in some factory down in the South West; I'm talking about English wine, which wine experts are, at long last, beginning to take seriously.

Think about it: there's no scientific reason why decent wine can't be made in this country- apparently there is less rainfall here than in the Germany, we have lots of suitable sheltered valleys with chalky soil, and with global warming, and resulting rising temperatures, the prospects for the fledgling English wine industry are beginning to look good.

So, a few nights ago, I opened a bottle of Chapel Down Flint Dry. It's supposed to be a bit similar to Chablis, and I certainly got the mineral, dry, flinty flavours. There was a hint of elderflower, too. I liked it! Next up for a tasting is going to be Denbies Greenfields Sparkling Cuvee (several vintages available) which has consistently won various International Wine Challenge Award medals. I'll report back...