Smoking Bishop & other Mulled Ports
Posted: 13:14 Wed 02 Dec 2020
“A Merry Christmas, Bob!” said Scrooge with an earnestness that could not be mistaken, as he clapped him on the back. “A merrier Christmas, Bob, my good fellow, than I have given you for many a year! I’ll raise your salary, and endeavour to assist your struggling family, and we will discuss your affairs this very afternoon over a bowl of smoking bishop, Bob!
A great sadness about modern British culture is whilst loads of “mulled wine” is drunk at Christmas, very little of it is any good. People tend either to chuck a load of random spices or a pre-made tea-bag-like sachet into some wine, add orange juice and heat. This is despite a very long tradition of quite elaborate sweetened, heated and spiced wine drinks.
At the top of the list, for me, is what is usually called “Smoking Bishop”, although before the publication of A Christmas Carol in 1843, it was always simply called “Bishop”: when Dickens wrote the above passage he was using the word “smoking” as a pure adjective to describe the steam coming off the bowl but it became so famous that the drink is usually know by that name now.
The characteristic of Bishop, as opposed to other spiced wines, is that the citrus fruit is roasted, studded with cloves, before macerating in Port and maybe wine.
My preferred recipe is a variant of this one from “Oxford Nigh Caps” published in 1827 which was then shamelessly plagiarised by Mrs Beeton:
Make several incisions in the rind of a lemon, stick cloves in the incisions, and roast the lemon by a slow fire. Put small but equal quantities of cinnamon, cloves, mace, and all-spice, and a race of ginger, into a saucepan, with half a pint of water ; let it boil until it is reduced one half. Boil one bottle of port wine ; burn a portion of the spirit out of it, by applying a lighted paper to the saucepan. Put the roasted lemons and spice into the wine ; stir it up well, and let it stand near the fire ten minutes. Rub a few knobs of sugar on the rind of a lemon, put the sugar into a bowl or jug, with the juice of half a lemon, (not roasted,) pour the wine upon it, grate some nutmeg into it, sweeten it to your taste, and serve it up with the lemon and spice floating in it.
Things I don’t like about this recipe include the short maceration time; the burning off of the spirit of the Port; and the use of the fresh rather than roasted lemon juice. We are also used to using more oranges now for these things, but I still like it to be lemon-forward. In January and February you can also try making it with seville or bitter oranges but, of course, those aren’t available in the UK in December.
My usual recipe is therefore as follows:
Bishop
Ingredients
2 75cl bottles un-oaked fruity red wine.
2 75cl bottles Port (either Ruby Reserve or Reserve Tawny)
4 lemons
2 oranges
1 cinnamon stick
2 tbsp all spice (whole), cracked
4 tbsp cloves (whole)
1 inch / 2½cm ginger, grated
5-6 pieces mace
½ whole nutmeg
sugar to taste
Method
Stud each citrus fruit with 12 cloves: 4 at the top; 4 in the middle; 4 around the bottom. Place in a heat-proof dish and roast in the oven at about 150°C / 300°F for about 1 hour.
Meanwhile, place 2 tbsp cloves, the cinnamon, all spice, ginger and mace in a saucepan with 1 pint (560ml) water. Boil until reduced by half.
Once the fruit and spices are ready, heat the wine in a saucepan to 60°C / 140°F. If you don’t have a cooking thermometer, then the aim is to get it as hot as possible before starting to boil of the alcohol: try looking for the very first fine bubbles around the edge.
Remove the citrus fruit from the oven and place in a large bowl. Cover with the spices and spiced water and then the hot wine. Cover. Leave overnight to macerate.
The next day, remove the citrus fruit, squeeze out the juice and add it to the spiced wine. Add the Port and grated nutmeg. Stir gently then sweeten if necessary. Give it a few more hours to settle and then strain the Bishop off the spices.
I then put it in bottles so that I when we would like to drink it, we heat one in a saucepan. Again the aim is to not let it get so hot you boil off the alcohol. When serving, make sure you heat the glasses or mugs first. More citrus or peel makes a nice garnish.
This year, I am using a Ruby Reserve Port from M&S rather than a Tawny. The red was very cheap bulk Italian wine. I added some unhistorical tonka beans as a variant. We are currently on day 1 but I will provide some pictures when it is finished.
Does anyone else make bishop? Or any other mulled Ports? Can we have your recipes?
A great sadness about modern British culture is whilst loads of “mulled wine” is drunk at Christmas, very little of it is any good. People tend either to chuck a load of random spices or a pre-made tea-bag-like sachet into some wine, add orange juice and heat. This is despite a very long tradition of quite elaborate sweetened, heated and spiced wine drinks.
At the top of the list, for me, is what is usually called “Smoking Bishop”, although before the publication of A Christmas Carol in 1843, it was always simply called “Bishop”: when Dickens wrote the above passage he was using the word “smoking” as a pure adjective to describe the steam coming off the bowl but it became so famous that the drink is usually know by that name now.
The characteristic of Bishop, as opposed to other spiced wines, is that the citrus fruit is roasted, studded with cloves, before macerating in Port and maybe wine.
My preferred recipe is a variant of this one from “Oxford Nigh Caps” published in 1827 which was then shamelessly plagiarised by Mrs Beeton:
Make several incisions in the rind of a lemon, stick cloves in the incisions, and roast the lemon by a slow fire. Put small but equal quantities of cinnamon, cloves, mace, and all-spice, and a race of ginger, into a saucepan, with half a pint of water ; let it boil until it is reduced one half. Boil one bottle of port wine ; burn a portion of the spirit out of it, by applying a lighted paper to the saucepan. Put the roasted lemons and spice into the wine ; stir it up well, and let it stand near the fire ten minutes. Rub a few knobs of sugar on the rind of a lemon, put the sugar into a bowl or jug, with the juice of half a lemon, (not roasted,) pour the wine upon it, grate some nutmeg into it, sweeten it to your taste, and serve it up with the lemon and spice floating in it.
Things I don’t like about this recipe include the short maceration time; the burning off of the spirit of the Port; and the use of the fresh rather than roasted lemon juice. We are also used to using more oranges now for these things, but I still like it to be lemon-forward. In January and February you can also try making it with seville or bitter oranges but, of course, those aren’t available in the UK in December.
My usual recipe is therefore as follows:
Bishop
Ingredients
2 75cl bottles un-oaked fruity red wine.
2 75cl bottles Port (either Ruby Reserve or Reserve Tawny)
4 lemons
2 oranges
1 cinnamon stick
2 tbsp all spice (whole), cracked
4 tbsp cloves (whole)
1 inch / 2½cm ginger, grated
5-6 pieces mace
½ whole nutmeg
sugar to taste
Method
Stud each citrus fruit with 12 cloves: 4 at the top; 4 in the middle; 4 around the bottom. Place in a heat-proof dish and roast in the oven at about 150°C / 300°F for about 1 hour.
Meanwhile, place 2 tbsp cloves, the cinnamon, all spice, ginger and mace in a saucepan with 1 pint (560ml) water. Boil until reduced by half.
Once the fruit and spices are ready, heat the wine in a saucepan to 60°C / 140°F. If you don’t have a cooking thermometer, then the aim is to get it as hot as possible before starting to boil of the alcohol: try looking for the very first fine bubbles around the edge.
Remove the citrus fruit from the oven and place in a large bowl. Cover with the spices and spiced water and then the hot wine. Cover. Leave overnight to macerate.
The next day, remove the citrus fruit, squeeze out the juice and add it to the spiced wine. Add the Port and grated nutmeg. Stir gently then sweeten if necessary. Give it a few more hours to settle and then strain the Bishop off the spices.
I then put it in bottles so that I when we would like to drink it, we heat one in a saucepan. Again the aim is to not let it get so hot you boil off the alcohol. When serving, make sure you heat the glasses or mugs first. More citrus or peel makes a nice garnish.
This year, I am using a Ruby Reserve Port from M&S rather than a Tawny. The red was very cheap bulk Italian wine. I added some unhistorical tonka beans as a variant. We are currently on day 1 but I will provide some pictures when it is finished.
Does anyone else make bishop? Or any other mulled Ports? Can we have your recipes?
