Mixology Monday this month is being hosted by Craig at Tiki Drinks & Indigo Firmaments. The theme is simply ’spice’, but as Craig quite rightly states, that could be anything from spicy Christmas drinks, to bitters, to bloody mary recipes and even types of bark or roots.

I’m going to play it moderately safe with my own recipe for Cornish Wassail (pronounced wauz’l)!

If you are a fan of mulled wine then you’re going to love this litle gem, it oozes seasonality, smells like Santa Clause’s kitchen and tastes delicious.

Wassail is a drink that originated in medieval times and is quite popular in the Germanic countries. The Wassail of the dark ages was typically made with Mead or beer, but it’s much better with a good bottle of farmhouse cider. In Cornwall1 there is quite a culture for cider and Wassail is very popular too. In fact, if you happen to be wandering around a Cornish orchard in the evening at this time of year, you might just spot the murky silhouettes of lightly intoxicated Wassailer’s!

Recipe (Serves 2)

The trick here is to not warm for too long as you lose some of the freshness. I like to keep it simple as well, so there is no reason why you can’t just add all the stuff straight to the pan:

• 400ml farmhouse cider (non-fizzy and yeasty is best)
• 25ml Calvados (Or even better – Somerset Cider Brandy)
• 100ml good quality apple juice
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 1 whole star anise
• 3 whole cloves
• 1 large tablespoon runny (Cornish) honey
• 1 small teaspoon of soft brown sugar
• 2 clementine wheels

The longer you warm the mixture, the more the spices will infuse, but if you go for too long you do lose some of the acidity and freshness from the cider and apple juice. I hate it when i’m handed mulled wine that just tastes like a spice draw, you need the balance of sweet and acid, so I recommend 5-10 minutes keeping it just off the boil.

Serve it in low thick glass teacups or short goblets, make sure you include a bit of the cinnamon stick and clementine wheel in each glass.

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