Travelling with Taste: Hot Drinks for Frosty Days
Traditional cuisine is part of the history and culture of many nations. Traditions, historical events, climatic conditions and geographical position of the country are reflected in its cuisine.
For example, in Scandinavia, the birthplace of cold winds and terrible winter frost, people used to warm themselves with glögg. It is traditionally made of red dry wine, spices and rum. Its ingredients look similar with ingredients of mulled wine glühwein, but real glögg is cooked within several days. First, some sugar and spices are added into wine (cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, ginger, allspice), the mix is warmed up to 60 degrees in a closed pot on slow fire. Then the wine is put to a cool place for at least 24 hours or even better for three days. After that the drink is filtered and warmed up one more time to 70 degrees. Before serving your glögg, some rum, cognac or vodka should be added to it. The drink is drunk only hot and out of small glass mugs. Glögg is known for its unique spicy smell and taste; it perfectly warms, gives strength and vitality, cheers the blood.
But Irish people, known for their love to alcoholic beverages, prefer to drink a cup or two of strong grog in a frosty day. The legend says that this drink was brought to Ireland by sailors and pirates. That’s why its original receipt is very simple: you should dilute rum with hot tea or just hot water. Pretty soon people who lived on the Irish land fell in love with the drink. They started adding hot milk, butter, honey and different liquors what made the drink even stronger. Grog can not only warm you in a nasty weather but boost your immune system, it is a good antiseptic and it is essential when the bad cold starts getting into your body.
Hot drinks are also popular in wet and foggy England. The receipt of the traditional English posset is known since the 15th century. This cocktail is cooked with hot wine, beer, milk and spices. Witty English also invented a special kind of glass mugs for it, which look more like tiny teapots. The drink has an incredible smell and useful antibacterial properties. A mug of hot posset in the evening can calm you down and will help you to relax.
Even Slavic people left their sign on the world cocktail map. In winter, in Ukraine people drink varenukha. This drink is more than 5 centuries old. Originally, it was cooked by the people who inhabited Left-bank Ukraine. Varenukha was boiled in a stove. It was made of hooch, honey, fruit and vulnerary plants. But now you can taste it in remote parts of the country only. But in Belarus, traditional drinks are the fashion again. Krambambula, a strong extract of honey and spices, can be tasted at any restaurant of the country. It has been cooked since the times of the Duchy of Lithuania, and the Belarusians have kept its receipt. It warms you, stimulates circulation, boosts the immune system.
To taste a traditional drink, you don’t need to go on a trip. You can cook these cocktails by yourself at home whenever you want and treat your nearest and dearest with these delicious drinks. And if you serve such exotic drinks to a holiday table, you’ll get fame of a chief cook among your friends.
