Cooking with Strawberry Wassail


 Wassail (/ˈwɒsəl/, /-eɪl/ WOSS-əl, -⁠ayl, likely from Old Norse "ves heill")[1] is a beverage made from hot mulled cider and spices, drunk traditionally as an integral part of wassailing, an ancient English Yuletide drinking ritual and salutation either involved in door-to-door charity-giving or used to ensure a good cider apple harvest the following year. [2] The drink is now increasingly popular from the Internet as a historical Christmas-time beverage.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wassail


I make Wassail as part of a fall tradition for a November event that my medieval reenactment (SCA-Barony of Shattered Crystal) group puts on called Crystal Ball. 

This is my recipe. This has been constructed though practice and testing. It is what I like and the people who I make it for also like. It is inspired by period wassail but is not a redaction of any period recipe. Oranges of the period were not like they are today. Todays oranges are a hybrid of a lemons and a tangerines. Oranges of period where they existed were used to make Orange-ade and were also candied because they were not sweet. They were not common person fruit in much Europe. In some areas there was no orange in the mulled cider used during fall harvest festival other similar drink was lambswool*. Also our apple juice is much sweeter the cider apples. But modern times are what they are and I like what I like. 

Also I make my brown sugar with 2 Tablespoons of black strap molasses and 1 cup of sugar. Supermarkets sell Dark brown sugar and that works fine. If you have an older persona you can use honey if it pleases you. again modern times are what they are and I like what I like. 


Strawberry's Wassail

I make it in a electric roasting pan

I do this the easiest way I can to make a large amount. 

I use frozen apple juice and orange juice concentrate 

1 container OJ plus all the water 

4 containers apple juice plus all the water

1-1/2 cup dark brown sugar

in to a muslin 

1/2 Tablespoon all spice 

1/2 Tablespoon  ginger

2    Tablespoons cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon cloves 

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg or mace

I simmer the spices in the mix for about 4 hours before starting to let people drink it. The wassail gets better the longer the spices are cooked in it and can benefit from more apple juice added as some will evaporate.

To make a hard cider version make hard cider first and use fresh squeezed juice from oranges (or not use pre made just makes sure there are no preservatives that will kill yeast) it is a 4:1 of cider to OJ adjust the amount of spices to the batch size. also there are other mulling spice combinations out there check around. 

you can make cider with the mulling spices in the mix it will come out different if pre cooked in the apple juice then yeast is added. experiment. 

*https://www.tudorsociety.com/tudor-cooking-with-claire-lambswool-wassail/

*https://www.thefooddictator.com/the-hirshon-old-english-apple-christmas-drink-lambswool-for-wassail/

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