Twelfth Night, Apples and Wassailing: A Traditional English Wassail Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What is the old 12th night wassailing? ›

Traditionally, the wassail is celebrated on Twelfth Night (variously on either 5 or 6 January). Some people still wassail on "Old Twelvey Night", 17 January, as it would have been before the introduction of the Gregorian Calendar in 1752. But we are friendly neighbours whom you have seen before.

What is wassailing? The purpose is to encourage the spirits into ensuring a good harvest the following season. It takes place on the twelfth night after Christmas and involves a visit to a nearby orchard for singing, dancing, drinking and general merrymaking.

Wassail is a hot, mulled punch often associated with Yuletide, often drunk from a 'wassail bowl'. The earliest versions were warmed mead into which roasted crab apples were dropped and burst to create a drink called 'lambswool' drunk on Lammas day, still known in Shakespeare's time.

1. : an early English toast to someone's health. 2. : a hot drink that is made with wine, beer, or cider, spices, sugar, and usually baked apples and is traditionally served in a large bowl especially at Christmastime. 3.

Traditionally, mulled cider is drunk on a wassail night. However, we haven't been to a wassail where this isn't every kind of cider under the sun. There's no better way to awaken the orchard than revelling in its previous fruits. Here are some of our favourites for your own wassail.

Slices of bread or toast were laid at the roots and sometimes tied to branches. Cider was also poured over the tree roots. The ceremony is said to "bless" the trees to produce a good crop in the forthcoming season.

Wassailing is a very ancient custom that is rarely done today. The word 'wassail' comes from the Anglo-Saxon phrase 'waes hael', which means 'good health'. Originally, the wassail was a drink made of mulled ale, curdled cream, roasted apples, eggs, cloves, ginger, nutmeg and sugar.

In the Welsh tradition, when wassailing house to house, the group would sing Welsh language songs and indulge in a ritual known as 'pwnco' which is an exchange of rhymes with the householder.

Caroling and Christmas caroling are two different things. According to History.org, the origins of modern Christmas caroling can be traced to wassailing, a term that has evolved for more than a millennium. What started as a simple greeting gradually became part of a toast made during ritualized drinking.

The purpose of wassailing is to 'bless' the trees to produce a good harvest for the coming year and generally took place on Twelfth Night (January 5th), or sometimes on 17th January, known as Old Twelfth Night.

What do you eat with wassail? ›

While wassail may not be a good food pairing, it is co*ckle-warming enjoyed by itself, or with dessert-type sweet fruit-based baked items, like apple pie, cherry tarts and maybe even beignets. Chocolate is not an ideal pairing, but could work depending on the sweetness level of the chocolate.

Wassailing: an ancient Pagan ritual conducted in deep mid-winter, to bless Apples trees for a bountiful harvest for the next season. The last time I wrote an article about Wassailing was in 2000 for CAMRA's Good Cider Guide, which was then edited by Dave Matthews.

But it wasn't just the spelling that altered to, it was the meaning, for waes hail as a salutation was now being applied as a drinking formula – something you say before having a swig of an alcoholic beverage. Modern equivalents would be cheers!

In some regions of medieval Britain, wassail involved a large gathering of tenants at the manor house where the master, channeling Rowena, would hold up a bowl of steaming spiced wine or ale and shout, “Wassail!” with the crowd replying, “Drink hail!” before devolving into Christmas revelry.

The text of the carol employs noun and verb forms of “wassail,” a word derived from the Old Norse ves heil and the Old English was hál and meaning “be in good health” or “be fortunate.” The phrase found first use as a simple greeting, but the Danish-speaking inhabitants of England seem to have turned was hail, and the ...

A popular Twelfth Night tradition was to have a bean and pea hidden inside a Twelfth-night cake; the "man who finds the bean in his slice of cake becomes King for the night while the lady who finds a pea in her slice of cake becomes Queen for the night." Following this selection, Twelfth Night parties would continue ...

Twelfth Night is a Christian holiday, celebrated on January 5. It marks the twelfth and final night of the Christmas season and the coming of Epiphany. Contrary to popular belief, Christmas is not just December 25. Contrary to popular belief, Christmas is not just December 25.

Traditional celebrations of Twelfth Night were marked by a reversal of normal social positions, as the monarchs and nobility became peasants for a day and vice versa. Shakespeare's play takes up these things and represents a fantasy world, the kingdom of Illyria, where the world has been turned upside down.

Presents were exchanged and, right across the social scale, parties and family gatherings took place. At the centre of the festivities was a large domed fruit cake hiding a dried bean and a dried pea, which was given to all members of the household, including servants.