Published 16:00 IST, December 24th 2020

Merry Christmas 2020: Check story behind Mulled wine, recipe of 'holiday season potion'

During Christmas, the craze for Mulled Wine sweeps across every household but tradition was originally started by Romans and dates as far back as 2nd century.

World News
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Just as people mark festivities on eve of Christmas in frosty temperature of December, families tonight will be busy preparing tritional Christmas-med cuisines near burning logs, singing Jingle Bells, anticipating Saint Nick’s arrival on reindeers with a glass of spicy ‘mulled’ wines near ir sparkling Christmas trees. However, this prompts one to think significance of mulled wine in Christmas celebration and reason this spicy potion is related to Christmas holiday season worldwide.

History of ‘Mulled Wine’

During Christmas, craze for mulled wine sweeps across every household but trition was originally started by Romans and dates as far back as 2nd century. As Romans h conquered much of Europe back n, y popularised tring of ‘special’ heated wine in an assortment of spices to feel warmth and battle chilled, biting winters. Throughout Europe and middle s, Romans mixed wine in tritional spices and drank in goblets. bottles were sold across region. special ‘spicy wine’ was also popular in fighting ailments and keeping sickness at bay.

[Mulled wine bottles. Credit: Pixabay]

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Recipe’s evolution as Christmas trition

As mulled wine was gaining trend across Europe, Sweden, much later, embraced trition with a slight tweak. Swedish mixed Rhen wine with sugar, honey, and spices to make a potion called ‘Claret’, or mixed wine with milk and heated it with spices in a second variation called Lutendrank, according to sources of medieval archives. Later in 1609, term glögg was opted worldwide, which was changed to cognacs-glögg in 1800.

By 1890s, drink found its association with Christmas trition after wine merchants tred barrels and bottles of ir similar recipes depicting Santa Claus. In 21st century, people me ir own version of mull wine with red and white wines, and sangria blends, and vermouth, with spices and mulled cider. While Scots mix nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger, orange, lemon, cardamom, and fennel seed to make mull wine, Bulgarians mix wine with honey and peppercorns, Hungarians prefer Amaretto.

[Mulled wine heated. Credit: Pixabay]

[Credit: Pixabay]

Make your Mull Wine at home

Here’s a quick and easy recipe for holiday season drink that one can easily prepare at home and celebrate among families and friends.

Ingredients:

750 ml (1 bottle) red wine
1 liter of unfiltered apple juice
4 whole cloves
3-star anise
2 long cinnamon sticks
Zest and juice of 1 orange
Orange peel to decorate

[Ingredients of Mulled Wine. Credit: Pixabay]

Preparation:

Put all ingredients in a saucepan or preserving pan and heat it gently, preventing it from boiling. After ingredients blend and are heated, turn off fire and remove potion in a tumbler. Cover recipe with a lid and leave it overnight to infuse for its spices and flavour to form and mix. When rey to serve, heat potion once again without boiling it, and fill goblet from large tureen with a lle. Serve with apple pies or cakes.