King Arthur lay at Camelot upon a Christmas-tide, with many a gallant lord and lovely lady, and all the noble brotherhood of the Round Table. There they held rich revels with gay talk and jest; one while they would ride forth to joust and tourney, and again back to the court to make carols; for there was the feast holden fifteen days with all the mirth that men could devise, song and glee, glorious to hear, in the daytime, and dancing at night.
Traditionally, The Twelve Days of Christmas starts on Christmas Day, and ends on Twelfth Night. It was a time of great Medieval feasting and revelry. I'm very fond of St George's Hall, Windsor, which is an early Victorian fantasy of what a Medieval Hall should look like; and the recent restorations after the disastrous fire have been superb. There's a suit of armour there, stuck up in front of a great roundel on the wall- with all the overtones of Arthurian legend and the great Medieval poem, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. And how suitable for a Christmas feast! In a similar vein, the engraving below shows the famous Boar's Head being brought into The Queen's College, Oxford. The boar is paraded into the Hall, to the strains of the fifteenth century Boar's Head Carol.
Still on the subject of Christmas food, I've got a great family recipe for Candied Fruit.
First, you need to get hold of five large oranges. Cut them in half, and squeeze out the juice. Discard the flesh, but not the pith. Next, cut the peel into strips about half an inch wide, and place them into a saucepan. Cover with boiling water and simmer for about five minutes. Drain and repeat this four times, using fresh water each time.
In a large pan, pour 250 ml (8 fl oz) of water over 1 1/2 lb of granulated sugar, and dissolve the sugar over a gentle heat. Add the orange peel, and cook them slowly, with the lid partially on, until they are soft. This should take about half an hour- or a bit longer. Leave them to cool down, and then sprinkle them with caster sugar.
Leave out to dry for a day or so- and then store them away in an air-tight tin. They are utterly delicious, and would make an original- if simple- present for someone. You can also try the same technique on lemons, but we all reckoned this Christmas, that the orange version was probably better. But as always, it's a matter of personal taste, isn't it?
