When it comes to the festive period, I’m definitely closer to the “most wonderful time of the year” than the “bah humbug” end of the spectrum. But even this fully paid-up Christmas-enjoyer would admit there is something peculiar about many of the things we get up to in this season – not least the fact that so much of what we eat and drink between now and the new year wouldn’t get anywhere near the menu at any other time.
That starts, for me, with turkey – a strictly Christmas Day-only meat in my household. It also includes such festive staples as Quality Street, dates, mincemeat, cloves, cranberry sauce, pigs in blankets and, for that sizeable majority of people who don’t share my love of the greatest of bitter brassicas, brussels sprouts.
Perhaps the starkest illustration of the seasonal transformation in our tastes and habits is booze. There’s the question of quantity, of course: a few years back, a survey by the alcohol harm-reduction charity Drinkaware put a figure on what has always been obvious to sober observers: almost two-thirds (61%) of British adults drink too much alcohol at Christmas. But there is also the matter of our eccentric choice of vehicles for all that overindulgence. The Christmas repertoire includes some very odd drinks indeed.
Has anyone, at least since the dawn of the Thatcher government, willingly consumed a snowball, that mix of boozy custardy Advocaat and lemonade, or a cup of homemade eggnog, in a room without tinsel? Is there some specific change in the atmospheric conditions between November and December that transforms mulled wine from a liquid scented candle into a cosy, comforting cup of spice? Why does my palate, which generally craves the bone-dry, Marmitey savouriness of fino and manzanilla sherry, start demanding the sweet Cadbury’s fruit-and-nuttiness of cream sherry the moment I spy a mince pie?
Extra sugar, some spice, a few more notches on the ABV, or a mix of all three, seem to be the common themes in these examples, as they do in so many of my other favourite Christmas-only drinks, from hot buttered spiced rum to herbal digestifs, upmarket Baileys-style cream liqueurs, ginger wine and heavy, dark winter beers (such as Harvey’s Christmas Ale, £4.52 as part of a case of 12 50cl bottles, shop.harveys.org.uk). That, plus a dose of the most potent of festive ingredients: nostalgia, a substance so powerful it can turn even the sickly-sweet favourite of teenage Christmases past, Malibu and Coke, into the perfect fuel for endless games of Pictionary and charades on Christmas night.
Not just for Christmas Day: six seasonal bottles worth drinking
Taste the Difference Mulled Wine
(£6, 75cl, Sainsbury’s)
While you may prefer to make your own by mixing ruby port, red wine, sugar, oranges, cloves, cinnamon and vanilla, Sainsbury’s Taste the Different version is the best of the ready-made examples I tasted from the supermarket. A satisfying balance of sweetness, bitterness and spice.
Waitrose Blueprint Cream Sherry
Jerez, Spain NV (£9.99, 75cl, Waitrose)
The dry, savoury styles fino and manzanilla may be more appropriate with tapas, but unfashionable cream is the sherry for satisfying the sweeter tooth of Christmas. The tanginess of oloroso is sweetened with molasses-like PX in a smooth, fruit-and-nutty style.
Warninks Original Advocaat
Netherlands (from £11, 70cl, Sainsbury’s; Tesco; Waitrose)
The very definition of a Christmas drink, Warninks egg liqueur is revolting on paper but actually rather silkily, vanilla-creamily delicious. Add lime, lemonade and ice to make a snowball – the classic, if slightly retro, festive cocktail.
Mentzendorff Kummel
Loire Valley, France (from £22.50, 50cl, tanners-wines.co.uk; cambridgewine.com; amathusdrinks.com)
A schnapps-like liqueur produced today in the Loire but with roots going back to the 19th century and the countryside outside the Latvian capital of Riga. A wonderfully sweet, spiced infusion of aniseed, caraway and cumin, this is a pristine pick-me-up after Christmas dinner.
Five Farms Irish Cream Liqueur
County Cork, Ireland (from £25.95, 70cl, fairleys-wines.co.uk; Sainsbury’s; thewhiskyexchange.com)
Artisan versions of mass-market flavours aren’t necessarily superior to the most successful brands (see boutique colas), but this blend of Irish whiskey with fresh cream from family farms in County Cork is on another level of luxurious crème caramel loveliness compared to more familiar cream liqueurs.
Chairman’s Reserve Spiced Rum
Saint Lucia (from £24, 70cl, Waitrose; thewhiskyexchange.com)
A rare Christmas drink that works just as well in the summer, this delightful spiced rum from Saint Lucia has all the elements (cinnamon, vanilla, nutmeg, clove, bitter orange) to make a suave, sippable seasonal digestif or the base for a hot buttered rum cocktail.
