The 12 Drinks of Christmas

'Christmas. It's all about spending time with family.'

'In our case, that's each other because, since our wives are sisters,

'we're not just drinking buddies, we're brothers-in-law.'

'Though we have done a fair bit of boozing over the years,

'this Christmas it's time to do it properly.

'We're going to be choosing our very own festive selection pack,

'the 12 drinks that'll ensure we're full of good cheer.

'Sometimes we'll be sourcing drinks...'

I'm about to get a ferry to go to Calais.

I'm looking for quite nice champagne.

Not stupid, I don't want to go nuts.

'..sometimes we'll be making them...'

It's a... HE MAKES WHIRRING SOUND

-It's the squealing of little apples.

-OK!

Talk among yourselves.

'..and sometimes we'll be competing to see whose drink is best.'

Boy, I hope you've got something good, because this is fantastic.

I don't know whether my brother-in-law has ever seen

a bottle of wine that only costs £3 or so.

'So open a bottle...'

That's amazing!

'..pour yourself a glass...'

That's delicious.

'..and join us for a festive drink...'

-HE GASPS

-Oh!

'..or 12.'

That's my Christmas winner.

'Just like the Nativity, the story of our search for

'the 12 Drinks Of Christmas features an inn.

'Or a pub, anyway.'

Now, this year, we're all round at mine.

What I think would be fun would be, this time round, to

think of exactly what we're going to drink.

we could have mulled wine. We could have not-mulled wine.

Normal wine...

Actually, get some really nice wine for Christmas lunch.

We'll need a brandy.

we should come up with a good Christmas cocktail.

-We need eggnog.

-Definitely eggnog.

Tell you what we should have, Giley,

an alcohol-free drink.

Forgive me for overreacting, but this is Christmas!

Somewhere over Christmas

it might be quite good to just hold back the tide.

-Here's my religious position, OK?

-Yeah.

Jesus went to a wedding in Cana of Galilee. It's the first thing.

He arrives at the wedding, "Here's some water." What did he do?

Wine. If you serve me a nonalcoholic cocktail,

I will put booze in it.

-There are plenty of drinks...

-It's going to be like an episode of Challenge Anneka.

-Challenge Hanukah!

-THEY LAUGH

This is going to be marvellous fun.

If we plan the booze, we can have as much

fun in the planning as we can in the guzzling.

I think so and we don't have to drink masses of it,

but it's quite fun to ring the changes

so it's not the same old thing... three times a day.

THEY CHUCKLE

'Since Jesus' first miracle was turning water into wine, it seems

'only right to go to some trouble over the drinks for his birthday.'

'If we're going to assemble a festive dozen,

'we'll need a centre of operations.

'A sort of booze HQ.'

Ah, Giley. Welcome to our Christmas house.

'Where else to begin but the central point of the festive season?

'Christmas lunch, the most important meal of the year.'

'So the stakes are high

'when it comes to choosing the wine to drink with it.

'We're agreed it ought to be red, but that's about all we agree on.'

I've always really loved good red wine, I think it's very important.

Even when I was a jobbing comic actor, when I first started out,

and I lived off potatoes and I would just eat kidney beans

out of the tin - I know...

I would do all that so I could occasionally spend a bit of money

on some decent wine.

And when you draw the cork on that, if you like, you are completing

the chemical reaction - the last thing that was required

was the oxygen. You do that, and then you pour it.

GLUGGING

And there it is. Hmm.

'But what's the point in splashing out

'when everyone's already half-sloshed by lunch time?'

I'm about to get a ferry to go to Calais on what is, technically,

a booze cruise, and I'm going to pick up something cheapish. I mean,

not rock-bottom, because it is Christmas.

But I'm going to pick up something which imagine will be a lot cheaper

than what Xander will have spend.

Something that will make Xander go, "Mmm, delicious,"

and then want another bottle of.

Giles likes wine, I know he does.

He's drunk enough of mine, so...

You know, I don't know what he's going to do, but he's going to find

something a bit more pragmatic, I think.

I suspect he'll go for something that's possibly got less of a story

behind it, which is fine, there is nothing wrong with that.

We'll use it for mulling... or it can go in the gravy.

'So, intrepid seafaring for me in my quest to find something

'drinkable for less than 20 quid.

'I'm out to prove to Xander that it can be done.'

'And a spot of market research for me.

'I'm taking my three contenders to a restaurant to find out

'which of them is the people's choice.

'Sommelier Ben van de Meutter's letting me loose on his diners.'

How do you do?

'All three are very much special-occasion wines.'

So here are my choices.

In terms of our pricing, this, actually,

the solid mainstay of the Left Bank, our least expensive.

I'm not going to say cheapest, by any means - our least expensive,

about 45 quid.

This one, the Chambolle, comes in about £49.

And this one, 52 quid.

Doink, doink, doink, it goes, in terms of pricing.

Yeah, not bargains, I know, but if you can't splash out at Christmas,

when can you?

'Now, my shift as a wine waiter during the lunch-time rush means

'I will actually be serving my actual wines to actual customers.'

Chicken or beef? Chicken or beef?

'Ben helps me brush up my act.'

So, now we going to decant it to separate the sediment from the wine.

'Now, sediment is one sign of a good wine.'

Oh, there we go.

'The less filtration in the wine-making process,

'the higher the quality of the wine at the end.'

Lovely, clear wine at this stage

'But whilst sediment is good in the bottle, you don't

'really want it in your glass.

'The candle makes it easier for you to see

'when the sediment reaches the neck of the bottle.'

-CLINKS BOTTLE

-Sorry, um...

If I could just have your attention for one second.

I'm your supply wine waiter for the day.

How do you do? Alexander's my name.

What I need from you today is your palate.

I'm going to give you three different styles of red wine.

One of them is the one I'm going to give to all my guests

on Christmas Day, and I want you to give me your honest opinion

on which one you think is the tiptop.

'While my brother-in-law is poncing about in a pinny,

'I'm also canvassing popular opinion

'amongst my fellow booze cruisers.'

What's the most you've ever spent on a bottle of wine?

Probably about £12.

My brother-in-law, Alexander Armstrong...

-Is he really your brother?

-He's my brother-in-law.

-Oh, wow.

-You can tell he's not my brother.

-No, I was going to say!

He's neither handsome nor clever enough.

We are having Christmas together as usual and he likes to buy

very, very posh wine, very expensive wine.

-It's...

-Nonsense?

-Just showing off, I think.

-Yeah.

If you've got the money, good luck to you.

What do you think of people who spend 50... Huge amounts of money,

50 quid on a bottle of wine?

What a total waste. I mean, I don't really have a lot of taste.

My daughter or probably the wife would know more about the taste.

-You admit that you don't have much taste.

-No.

-THEY LAUGH

-I would drink anything.

-Really?!

'So I'm not alone in thinking there's no need to spend a fortune

'to get something good.

'Xander likes French wines and he likes them old and expensive.

'If I'm going to fool him

'with a bargain, I need to call in the cavalry.'

There's nobody more exacting about wine than a Frenchman.

So I am going to meet someone who is both a Frenchman and a wine critic,

a double-whammy - that ought to knock Armstrong's posh grog for six.

'Some might say that drafting in Olivier Poels is cheating.

'But there's honour at stake.'

-Hi.

-Hello, how are you?

'Deploy the Frenchman.'

We eat the turkey roasted, with sausages wrapped in bacon,

with Brussels sprouts with chestnuts...

Don't laugh at our national cuisine! That's what we have at Christmas.

-A bread sauce.

-That's the problem.

-It is our problem.

A bread sauce, cranberry jelly,

but what's going to go well with that kind of fatty, rich, roasted...?

We can try something elegant. This one, why not?

So, what was good in 2009? Sunshine?

Yes, sunshine, it was hot, vintage,

and the conditions during the harvest were perfect.

'One place to look for good value is the Languedoc region.

'The wines there used to be rather low-quality but in the last

'decade they've really improved and prices haven't caught up.'

It's not that it needs to be so much good,

it needs to taste expensive.

It needs to taste grand.

Between 10 and 20 or 25 euros you can have really, really good wines.

This is a good wine for a very reasonable price, as you can see.

Well, it's only 13 euros.

So look at this.

This is Chateau Sociando-Mallet, which is often compared

to the best crus classes.

-Sometimes, when you make...

-Perfect.

When you have blind tastings, sometimes it wins.

Can you find anything in here drinkable that's really cheap?

-Really cheap?

-That won't kill me.

It is a challenge. Nobody can guess the price you paid for this wine.

I don't know whether my brother-in-law has ever seen

a bottle of wine that only cost £3.

'I have now.

'My contenders cost a little bit more than that.

'First, there's a claret from Bordeaux.

'Now, clarets can be left to age for years and years, but this is a 2002,

'so 11 years old.

'You can see the maturity of a wine from its colour.

'Younger ones have a slightly bluish tinge

'and really old ones are sort of brownish.'

-What about the taste, do you like that?

-I like the aftertaste,

it's quite oaky, quite smoky.

I think it's great, I think you could drink quite a lot of it

-cos it's not too heavy.

-It is very nice, actually.

Oh, I quite like that, it's quite earthy.

'Next, another French one. This one is a 2001 Burgundy,

'so a pinot noir.

'Now, 2001's a good vintage but not a classic like 2000 or 2005,

'when the weather conditions were perfect.'

I don't think it will be as big a talking point.

-OK, not as big a talking point.

-Personally, myself...

OK, fine, we'll get back to the wine-maker.

and pass on your comments.

It lingers on the palate a little bit longer than the first.

-Is it a nice aftertaste or a fruity aftertaste?

-It's fruity.

-Or a tannin aftertaste?

-No, tannin.

I am smelling fruit. That last one was very fruity.

'Last, a bit of a curveball, a Lebanese wine.

'A 1996 vintage, it's the oldest of my three wines

'and the most expensive, but will my tables appreciate it?

'Older wines have leathery, mushroomy flavours,

'so something this age might not be for everyone.'

-Oh, I really like that.

-It's not the...

That almost tastes a bit Christmassy.

Yeah, I can go along with that.

I like it. I would drink worrying quantities, I think!

It's the nicest of the three.

There's something a little unusual about it

but not necessarily in a good way.

No, it's not quite there. No.

So, we now come to the all-important vote.

I'd go for this wine.

-You're going for number three.

-I would agree.

And how about you?

This is much smoother and it would complement the dish much better.

Number three, OK, well...

-I would go for number three.

-You are going to go for number three.

Number one, and I would be delighted to come to Christmas

if you were serving that.

OK, yes, I think we'll be serving it about 1.30pm. OK?

-Absolutely.

-Um, make sure you're there!

Enjoy the rest of your lunch and thank you

so much for lending us your palates.

-No, thank you!

-Brilliant.

'So the Lebanese wine has seen off two types of French.

'Not as surprising as it might first appear, when you consider

'wine's been made in the Lebanon for thousands of years.

'Another ancient wine-producing nation that's worth a look is

'Turkey.

'Now, that would be good for Christmas.'

'Meanwhile, on my side of the Channel...'

So, you must be used to this kind of glamorous setting for

-a wine tasting.

-Thank you very much for giving me

the opportunity to have this fantastic tasting room.

-Should we start with the very cheap stuff?

-Yes, of course.

This one was 4.48 euros, about £3.50.

Not expensive at all, so don't expect something too incredible.

You chose this wine, pal - it's your reputation.

I've had better wines!

THEY LAUGH

Four euros.

Four euros. I'll give you three for it.

-Do you remember how much this one was?

-Yes, between 13 and 14.

It's clinging on to the side of the glass.

Just first nose, you are able to... What you're looking for.

Yeah, absolutely.

I spit inside.

I'm driving.

A little bit... No, nothing's gone down the throat.

No, that's delicious.

Let's go to the Sociando-Mallet.

This one was a bit more expensive. This one was...23 euros.

23 euros.

Less aggressive even than the last one.

Yes, but feel the minerality, you feel the precision of the fruit.

The wine is deep.

OK, well, that's a nice claret.

If your brother-in-law loves typical Bordeaux-style wines, with this,

he can't be disappointed.

'So I've got a 20-quid bottle to take on whatever Xander's

'bringing to the table for Christmas lunch.'

I think a lot of people would look on £20 as a pretty

sky-high limit on a bottle of wine.

I understand. I mean, the prices of wine vary from £10 up to sky-high.

The price is set by a few things, meaning the demand

and the production. So you only, probably, have 3,000 bottles

of Chateau Musar, everyone wants it, the price goes up.

But then, of course, you have the ageing as well.

Somebody had to nurture it and keep it in a good storing place,

and now you're buying it, and that's why you're paying £50.

In '97 or '98 it would not have cost you £50,

but you would have had to store it yourself.

If I'd bought a case of that in 1997 I'd probably have drunk it in 1998.

There it is.

'The lesson here is that we ought to be buying

'the wine for Christmas 2023 now while it's reasonably affordable...'

Mmm-mmm.

'..and then we should put it in a very safe place

'and forget about it.'

I think there's a clear winner. Your very, very good health.

-Cheers.

-And happy Christmas, I should say.

-Same to you.

BEEP

ANSWERPHONE: 'Please leave your message after the tone.'

'Ah, Giles! You're not answering.'

'I'm just ringing to tell you that we have selected a wine.'

I hope you've got something good, because this is fantastic.

It's perfect. It's Christmassy, it's grown-up.

Listen, I'm not going to...

I won't bang on about it too much when the wine is so eloquent.

'But I hope you've got something good.'

Why, by the way, has this got a French ring on it?

'We'll see whose wine wins it over Christmas lunch,

'but there are 11 more drinks to go.'

'Mm, how about some Christmas spirit? Brandy.'

'Or rather Cognac or Armagnac.'

'Basically anything with an "ac" on the end.'

'Presumably, that's the sound you make when you've had a swig. "Ac!"'

'But brandy's not just for drinking.'

'Oh, no! We need it for brandy butter, mulled wine,

'eggnog and getting a good flame on the pud.'

'Having a flaming pudding's about alcohol content.'

'Brandy is usually around 40% proof.'

You're probably wondering why we're dressed like this.

I can reveal that we'll be lighting some Christmas puddings

and we have a fireman on hand.

I've got to say, "Don't try this at home."

Have you met my friend here?

Ha-ha! Have you met MY friend?

Yeah, all right! Uh-huh...

Yeah!

This is about three years old.

We'll see how well or badly this burns. I guess not that well.

At Christmas, people grab the brandy they had from last year.

-They've had it for years.

-Pour it on... Nothing.

Why not get one bottle that'll do you for the whole Christmas season?

Make brandy butter with it, light your Christmas pudding with it,

maybe swill it round a glass and enjoy it.

All I can think of when I look at you is Flashdance.

Ha-ha!

OK. So, listen. We've got three Christmas puddings.

I'm going to ask you to put some brandy...

Let's start with common or garden brandy

-from the back of grandma's cupboard.

-Right.

We'll splosh it on.

There you go! Now let's see if we can raise a flame.

You're certainly pushing it around the thing.

Yeah, that's rubbish!

The reason that one didn't work is because it was a schoolyard error.

You've used the old brandy from the back of the cabinet.

It's been open two or three years and all the alcohol has evaporated.

You can smell there isn't really any there. That's just grim!

-You want lots of alcohol, so it's got to be new brandy.

-OK.

And it should be warm

so that the alcohol molecules break away from the water molecules

in the rest of the liquid and can catch fire and make sparky dazzle.

OK. Are you ready?

-The hot part is the blue part of the flame, isn't it?

-Yeah.

That's where it's... Oh, I can smell burning hair!

-No, it's burning glove.

-Shall we go for it?

-Yeah, OK.

Everybody stand a long, long way back. Anything could happen.

OK, I'm stepping back. That is burning!

Look at that! That's beautiful. There we are!

OK. Our third option, which may work even better, is going to be

the Austrian rum, 80% proof.

It is precisely twice as flammable as the Cognac, which is 40%.

This is what the Von Trap family lived on.

We're going to make a little hole there.

We need to warm this stuff. Where are you going with that?

Smell that! It smells of treacle toffees.

I've got it in here... Just me!!

Can I just taste it? Because it doesn't smell, to me, very alcoholic.

Mm!

CLEARS THROAT

LAUGHTER

That's enough. That's enough.

Oh! Look at it! Wow!

Now, that is a... That is...

That is burning beautifully, isn't it?

That holds up all our theories. That is going to burn until Easter.

That's given us a pretty unequivocal answer, hasn't it?

Certainly the mouthful of Stroh has given me a pretty unequivocal...

I spat it all out and yet I'm still hammered.

-It's still burning. It's actually burnt practically away.

-Yeah.

Fantastic! There we are! If you have no interest in brandy,

but you only want something that's going to work on your pudding,

either crumble some firelighters on top or little bit of this Stroh.

'Even if you do use it on your Christmas pudding,

'it's probably not advisable

'to drink 80% proof rum on Christmas Eve.'

'It might kind of ruin the next day.'

'So how about a bespoke cocktail instead?'

'That's something of a tradition in our family.'

'You like a twist on a classic, but this year I think we should be

'a bit racier...'

BOTH: Aha!

'..and try something young people are drinking.'

'Good thing we can call on a man

'at the cutting edge of cocktail invention.'

'Tony Conigliaro, the Willy Wonka of booze.'

What we have is a very specific need for a Christmas Eve cocktail.

OK. So what ideas do you have?

I was thinking Christmas Eve, you probably want to stay up

and wrap presents for the kids and sort of start on the turkey.

Where are you going with this, Giley?

I'm going for an espresso Martini, so espresso and vodka,

but on the top you would float Irish cream liqueur.

I think that would be an espresso "ho, ho, ho" Martini.

So, this is what, your base?

Yes, this is the vodka and coffee.

I think this is going to be de-licious.

This is very exciting.

'I'm hoping the Irish cream liqueur will complement the coffee

'in my espresso Martini, but will it float?'

This is how you'll keep the suspension on top.

You think it's going to disappear under the crema?

I think it might do. We'll see.

It's gone under it!

-But it will sit on top of the coffee?

-No, it's not.

It's going to come back up. Don't say it with such glee!

It's looking rather amazing.

-Were you expecting that?

-Yes, to a certain extent.

That's got a lot of sugar in it and the density is a lot heavier

than the other ingredients, so it's bound to sink, to a certain point.

There we are!

I think that is fantastic!

I didn't quite get enough Baileys with that to temper it.

But it's nice. It is very nice.

That flavour is weirdly Christmassy. Why on earth it should be...

Give it a nice big slug. That'll put hair on your chest.

It's like being back at university,

doing kind of strange shots of stuff.

-What are you saying?

-It's quite hardcore.

-I am hardcore!

'Over Christmas last year, British drinkers bought over

'130,000 bottles of Irish cream liqueur a day.'

'That's a bottle and half a second.'

'But how much of it can you really drink?'

'My cocktail suggestion is an altogether lighter proposition.'

'A twist on a gin-based classic.'

-Mine's called the Ginger Lady.

-OK.

You won't be surprised to hear she's a sister drink to the White Lady.

-OK.

-So, it's lemon juice, gin,

obviously two parts gin, one part lemon juice,

and instead of Cointreau, use The King's Ginger,

-that lovely ginger liqueur.

-Yeah.

So, there's the gin.

There's the gin. We'll use about 40 and 20 of lemon...

I'm going to go as close as possible to the White Lady proportions.

It really looks remarkably like a White Lady.

-Good health, Tony.

-Cheers!

-See! That's what you should have done!

-What? Toasted him?

-Yeah, yeah.

There is a little bit of heat from the ginger. It's got the lightness.

We were wanting something...

Obviously, Christmas is quite "grr" and heavy.

A lot of heavy food and stodgy stuff.

A lot of preserves and things like that.

This would cut through that.

That's more sophisticated.

It's more up my street because it's more classical in that respect.

Mm.

It's... I hate to say it. It's a more sophisticated cocktail

than whatever rubbish was that I made! Three layers of brown.

That's sophisticated and delicious. I would drink it at Christmas.

'Cocktails are enjoying a real renaissance.'

'They haven't been this popular since the Jazz Age of the 1920s.'

'We've settled on one for Christmas Eve,

'but there may be people who'd like something without alcohol.'

'Do we know any of them? Certainly none in our family.'

'We ought to have something for the teetotal. Who knows?'

'Maybe a single, solitary booze-free offering might do us some good too.'

'Like any right-thinking person, I'd say,

' "If you want something nonalcoholic, turn on a tap." '

Somewhere over the Christmas period, we'll be entertaining

expectant mothers, probably, drivers...

A fruitier Christmas than normal, then?

There may be recovering alcoholics coming for a drink.

Recovering alcoholic, pregnant people doing the driving. What they want...

They'll want something other than fizzy water.

I'm saying half a cup of elderflower...yummy cordial,

mix that with a litre of soda water.

There we are! Come on! Look!

We're mixing it around with the fizz.

I'm thinking about giving up the booze, driving,

and becoming pregnant just so I qualify for one of these!

You want the juice of half a lime?

Yes. Two halves, in fact.

The next thing we'll pop in here is...

a little handful of blackberries.

Why don't you throw them in the gl... No?

-HE WHISPERS:

-No, no, no.

-OK.

-In they go. Whee!

That one's going round and round.

There you are! I'm just bruising the mint.

You are going to love this, I tell you now.

In that goes. There we are. In goes the bruised mint.

-Yum!

-OK. Now, look.

Could you make me a lime twist and while you're doing that,

I'm going to make a little minty garnish.

Do you want me to hang it over the...?

Just bung it in there, don't you think?

Have a swig.

Oh, my! Delicious. I've changed my mind about everything!

Listen! This is just to buy yourself...

Buy your poor liver a precious little break for an hour or so.

You drink this and it goes, "Ugh...

"Oh, hang on! That's quite... Mm! Oh!"

Aah!

You would say if I'd got something in my teeth, wouldn't you?

'Consider my liver regenerated. More booze, please!'

'How about a hot cider punch that was once a Christmas tradition?'

'Ah! As in a wassail bowl.'

'Very popular with the Victorians, who served it to carollers.'

'But it goes back a lot further than that.'

'The word "wassail" comes from the Anglo-Saxon "wes hal" - "be whole".

'Or "good health" to you and me.'

'A wassail bowl was filled with punch made from ale or cider

'with spices and sugar.'

'We're going for cider, which is why we're in an orchard in Somerset.'

-Do you actually like cider?

-Yeah, I do.

My parents thought it was nonalcoholic,

so we were given it all our lives.

-And look how well you've turned out!

-Exactly. You see!

No, I do like it.

'Good thing, too, as we're meeting Andrew Quinlan

'from Orchard Pig cider.'

-Andrew, good morning.

-Good morning.

Here we are in the heart of cider country.

-Thousands of years we've been drinking cider?

-Yes, for a long time.

In fact, it's been currency here for a long time.

Farm workers used to get paid in cider.

Part-payment, but it was safer than water.

Of course, because water was full of all kinds of disease, such a typhus.

-And the alcohol killed them...

-Ah!

..in the cider, so that's why you could drink cider safely,

as part of your wage and instead of water.

'There are two types of wassailing.'

'One that happens in orchards in January when people make a rumpus

'to wake up the trees so they get a good harvest later in the year.'

# So we may have apples and cider next year. #

Copyright Armstrong 2013.

'Bit early for that.'

'We're interested in the other one, Christmas wassailing,'

'an ancient feudal practice where peasants called on their lord

'for a free feed.'

'They got a cup of punch from the wassail bowl too.'

'Hence, our need for some cider, which obviously starts with apples.'

I've selected a couple of beauties here.

This is a cox. Good old-fashioned cox. Bite into that.

I want to show you the difference between a good eating apple

and a cider apple.

It's not a trick, you cynical man!

Mm! God! That's delicious!

Can you eat cider apples?

Yes, you can. While that's still sweet in your mouth, try that.

That's a dabbernet apple. These'll make a good cider.

A dabbernet Sauvignon.

Absolutely.

Now, you'll get juice to start with then it'll hit you.

That's not even nasty in that it's not even food.

I thought it would be comically sour. Why is that better for cider?

The tannin in those will give you the flavour.

You don't hand-pick cider apples from the tree.

They go on the ground. A machine comes and hoovers them up.

So you pick up the windfalls?

When an apple lands, it bruises and that's stage one of fermentation.

Eating apples have to be hand-picked.

If they touch the ground, you can't use them.

If there are bugs or anything gets on the apple,

the fermentation process kills them.

If we want to make some cider,

we're going to have to collect some apples.

Yuk!

'Where's that machine he was talking about?'

'Production here's normally on a slightly larger scale but we only

want to make a demijohn so we're using a more traditional method.'

This is going to take about a day.

We should be ready by Christmas!

We all know that apples are very good for you,

an apple a day and all that,

but I've heard that cider's meant to be very good for you.

What's in cider that's so good for you?

So I feel good about my wassail cup.

A cider apple has about double the antioxidants as an eating apple.

'Not convinced cider really counts as one of your five a day.'

'Mmmm, be nice if it did.'

'First we mill our apples to break them down a bit

'so it's easier to get the juice out.'

Let's move the Ark of the Covenant here.

'Then the apples are pressed to extract the juice.'

Do you want a go?

Listen, listen. The squealing of little apples.

Listen!

I think Xander can do a bit better than that.

Oh, do you now?

'It doesn't look very appetising now.'

'But in about six months it'll be yum.'

There you go, guys, there's your cider.

I shall look forward to hearing all about how that turns out.

We'll tell you in slurry voices. Thank you.

Pleasure.

'But the wassail bowl's not the only hot booze treat we've got in store.

'There's wine to be mulled too.'

'We've been drinking mulled wine in the winter

'since at least the 17th century, but all too often nowadays

'it's not nearly as delicious as it ought to be.'

Where do you stand on mulled wine?

It's fine, quite like it.

Doesn't get you too drunk, cos the alcohol blows off.

Good thing to do with rubbish wine brought round by stingy guests.

I'm going to take issue with that.

The problem that mulled wine has is most people

think it's nice and wonder why they don't drink more.

They wake up the next morning like it was Armageddon

and think, "Oh, crikey! Never having mulled wine again."

The reason is, this is my theory,

that people use industrial wine to make it.

You'd never make mulled wine unless you use the cheapest wine

from the least wine-producing country.

The "good wine doesn't give you a hangover" school of thinking.

-I buy into that completely.

-I totally don't.

-Really?

I think you just drink less of it because it's so expensive.

-Maybe that's it. Anyway, listen!

-Mm-hm.

What we're going to do is make mulled wine my way.

I've taken this wine, popped it into a mixing bowl and I've

steeped it in sultanas and raisins, oranges and a stick of cinnamon.

So I'm going to chuck that into the pan.

I'll start it off on the hot side of the Aga.

Pop that it there.

If I can do it without spilling it, that will be brilliant.

Look at all that fruit!

OK. Now, top this up with a bit more wine.

To that, I'll add two further sticks of cinnamon,

six cardamom pods, approximately,

orange zest, some almond flakes in there as well.

Are you making a cake or a drink?

OK, and last little addition is 150ml of brandy

which we'll pop in there.

'You might have noticed that I haven't added sugar.

'My mulled wine's sweetened by the dried fruit

'that steeped in it overnight.'

'Mulled wine has been associated with Christmas since at least 1843,

'when it appeared in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol

'under the rather off-putting name of the Smoking Bishop.'

The other thing that's so lovely

is having something in a big bowl that everyone shares.

A punch is a wonderfully social thing to have.

You are all coming together, sharing the same wine

in a sort of sacramental way.

That's amazing!

That is really delicious.

It doesn't taste like stinky old mulled wine.

I would go so far as to say that's the sort of thing

Dickens was thinking of with the Smoking Bishop in A Christmas Carol.

Look at that!

I mean, that... Just the sheer action of this is delicious.

Without the sugar, you really do get the almonds

because there's an almond sweetness.

I'm going to say that is a triumph. A ruddy triumph.

-It is a ruddy triumph.

-Yeah, good.

'Our next drink is another winter warmer, a festive take on gin.

'Something for the hipflask on your post-Christmas lunch walk.'

'It's British ingenuity in a bottle.

'How to take an inedible fruit and make it yummy?'

'Why, soak it in gin and sugar, of course!'

'It can only be sloe gin.

'That'll make a change from a G&T for your auntie.'

'First, we'll need some sloes, the fruit of the blackthorn bush,

'usually harvested in the autumn.'

So here we are. We've got our sloes. Some of them are green.

Some have undressed.

Some have. Rather than pricking them, we've frozen these.

In the thawing, that breaks the skins

and you get this nice, pulpy effect to let the flesh get at the gin.

The point is, we could not bother at all and just drink this.

-HE SLURS:

-I already have!

-In that case, bung the sugar in.

-OK. So, sugar.

'The general rule of thumb is half the amount of sugar to sloes.

'We're using 250g of sugar for 500g of sloes.'

'And good quality London Dry gin.'

I'm going to close that and give it a good shake.

-Do you want to do some shaking?

-Yeah.

Basically, you just bung that away in a dark cupboard

ideally for about six months

and every time you remember, give it a shake.

'Luckily, we don't have to wait six months.

'Here's some we prepared earlier.'

That's quite brown now.

It's quite syrupy as well, isn't it?

The smell's a bit like the inside of a cherry liqueur or something.

Yeah, yeah.

Mm.

Oh, that's delicious.

Oh, God, that is really good. It really does warm you up.

The reason it's such a good Christmas drink is,

from a growing point of view, it's a Spartan time of year.

You make the most of the things you've got.

You eat brassicas, sprouts and things

and sloes are one of the only things you could have harvested

at that time of year.

It's a properly English thing. It's flavours of the hedgerow.

It's a proper English, mid-winter, pagan drink.

'Christmas is all about tradition,

'so it's not often we get to try something brand-new.'

If you've got any left after torching your pudding,

here's something else to do with your brandy.

We'll make a drink I've never made before and never had before.

But only because I'm worried that once I've had it,

I'll always want it.

-We're talking, surely, about...

-The eggnog.

Isn't it just a booze omelette in a glass?

I'll talk you through this recipe. I want to see how well you do.

Two medium eggs, separate them.

We want the yolks and the whites, so make sure you keep both.

In a large bowl, beat the egg yolks and while you're doing that,

I'll add the sugar. The Americans lay claim to eggnog, don't they?

Their big Christmas drink.

Didn't your people used to own America? Slower! Slower!

A tiny little bit that was granted to an ancestor of mine

near Connecticut.

He had the rights to all the lands to the West.

My family weren't even allowed to own the patch of Poland

on which they were regularly beaten while planting measly potatoes.

We'll heat the milk to almost boiling.

More sugar, your highness.

I'm beating faster because of my proletariat rage.

LAUGHTER

I'll have a look at this milk... which is now steaming nicely.

I think that is now pretty much ready.

Stop! Stop! Have you got an apron of any kind?

I'm so glad you said that, because I have.

'The egg, sugar and milk mixture goes back on the heat with some

'vanilla extract and a slug of brandy.'

'The egg whites are whisked to soft peaks.'

Fold the, er, egg whites.

Fold in the...

Fold in the egg whites.

The next thing we have to do is whip this cream up.

Think about something that makes you really angry.

Fold that in.

It's a lovely thick mixture.

-Now...

-Yep!

Look at that! Look at... Oh, my God! That looks delicious!

It sounds yummy as well.

There we are.

-Mm!

-Mm!

Aw! Look at that! Aw!

Can I have some nutmeg on my eggnog?

Yes, you can.

I hate to say, that's delicious.

Yes. We need to find a place for it in the Christmas calendar

which is not between the turkey and...

It goes on for 12 days, so we need something...

perhaps this is for day five or day six

when you don't fancy eating anything at all.

But, come drink time, maybe you fancy a whole day's nutrients...

So it's a meal substitute.

Like a protein drink that body builders take but with booze in.

But with booze in.

The eggnog was something of a revelation

but our next drink is more of a festive staple.

And it's probably the big-money one for most of us.

It's the drink that gives Christmas its sparkle - champagne.

Or sparkling wine, anyway.

Nothing really says Christmas to me more than that mad dash

around a department store with an hour-and-a-half to buy

50 presents and you're in a sweat.

A great part of Christmas.

Look at this! I think there's just about enough champagne in there

for Giles and me.

'I need to find a fizz that'll pop Giles's cork.

'I'm enlisting the help of Dawn Davies, the wine buyer here.'

-Dawn!

-Hi.

-Hello. Alexander.

Now, here's the deal.

I'm looking for quite nice champagne. Not stupid.

I'm not going nuts.

Kind of non-vintage.

-OK.

-But I know Giley's going to try to find something

from the more sensible end.

'Predictably, Xander's going for some over-priced French muck.

'But I've got something more original in my sights.

'A home-grown sparkling wine from this vineyard in Kent.

'Chief executive Ben Walgate's giving me a tour.'

What's so good about Kent for growing wine?

Kent's good for growing fruit. It's well known...

You know, garden of England.

But much of south-east England has been very successful

in producing top quality champagne fruit.

I think it's a combination of choosing great south-facing

sites at low elevation like this with great soil.

Is the soil chalky?

One sees the white cliffs of Dover and assumes it's all on chalk.

The Cote de Blanc in Champagne is famous for being

a chalk soil, producing great Chardonnay.

We have chalk soils that share the same make-up.

-Comparable with the champagne regions of France?

-Yes.

How do your growing conditions here compare with Epinee,

where champagne comes from?

In terms of temperature, we're achieving now the levels of ripeness

they were getting 10-15 years ago in Champagne.

Things are moving.

-The world's getting warmer.

-A subtle change. One degree...

Did you like how the sun came out as I said the world's getting warmer?!

-So we're profiting from global warming?

-We are.

'No need for wellies in the West End. Shop smart, I say.

'Champagne can be made from three different types of grapes.

'Pinot noir, pinot meunier and chardonnay.

'In vintage champagne, the grapes are from the same year,

'but non-vintage is a blend of different wines

'from different years.'

The best thing about non-vintage is that it's very consistent

year on year, so a lot of people go for brands

because they like the knowledge that it tastes the same every year.

'Most of the champagne we buy is non-vintage.

'It's the mix of grapes that accounts for the difference in taste

'between one brand and another.'

The first one I'll recommend is our own-label champagne.

This is 70% pinot noir.

-That'll go nicely with smoked salmon.

-Absolutely.

The second one is 100% chardonnay.

A blanc de blancs. Yeah, right.

100%. You know your stuff!

'It's worth looking at champagne made by smaller producers.

'They're less famous but these vineyards,

'known as grower-producers, often supply the big names with grapes

'for their non-vintage champagne, whilst also making their own.'

I'm a really big fan of what we call grower champagnes.

A lot of the big houses, they've got to buy in a lot of their grapes.

At some point, you cannot make good wine from bad grapes.

So those with most control in the vineyards are going to make

some really interesting things.

My great-uncle was the first person to bring this over in quantity.

-He used to run Metzendorff.

-Aah! Very interesting!

My great-uncle Tim.

'Xander's got a woman doing the work for him,

'but I'll help some women do theirs.'

I want to introduce Ann and Rita, long-standing Gusbourne pickers.

-Hello, ladies.

-Hello!

-Do you come here every season?

-We've been coming here five years.

-Yes.

Is that your best chat-up line?

No, I'm biding my time, waiting till you leave us alone.

I hate to pander to cliches or anything, but hard agricultural

labour in fields I tend to think of as a young man's job.

We are early 70s, so if we can do it, you can do it.

-That one's good enough to go?

-Yes.

-You just throw them?

-No, you put them in gently.

You're a local lady, you must be proud?

We are. It was used at the Palace.

I think the Duchess of Cornwall likes it.

She's very patriotic. The whole family.

They're all supportive of English things.

So that's good, isn't it?

'We've only been making sparkling wine in Britain for a couple

'of decades, but already we're giving the French a run for their money.'

'But French champagne doesn't have to be as expensive as you might

'think, if you aren't bothered about what's on the label.'

-This is your house champagne.

-It is.

It's always a good tip to go for house champagne,

because the wine buyers at supermarkets

are always incredibly well-informed

and they always know what the good things are to go for.

And, interesting, this made predominantly from red grapes.

-The colour of the grapes comes from the skins...

-Sure.

-..it doesn't actually come from the pulp.

So if it's pressed very, very gently

and not left in contact with the skins, you can keep that pale colour

without any tinges of red or rose.

'Oh, what a treat! Three delicious champagnes

'and all remarkably different

'but, somewhat boringly, I'm going with the old family favourite.'

It is absolutely delicious. I'm delighted with that.

-We should cheers to that.

-Yeah, cheers to that.

'So there's a surprise. He's bought the same thing he always does.

'Time to taste the fruits of Ann and Rita's labours.

'The first is a 2008 brut reserve

'made from all three kinds of champagne grapes.'

I always put my hand here for tasting, do you not find?

I see you've got... I like to...

Try to avoid that, if I can.

-So, what do you think?

-That's amazing.

Can you tell, when you taste it,

that it's had three-and-a-half years maturing on its lees?

Yeah, no, I'd have said more like three years...seven months,

probably, on the lees.

'The next is made only from chardonnay grapes.'

What to expect from the blanc de blancs?

Is there a way of pronouncing blanc de blancs that that doesn't make you sound like Del Boy Trotter?

"Blong de blong"? Yeah, exactly.

It's a bit dodgy, isn't it?

-Now, it's a greener colour, isn't it?

-Yeah.

Good blanc de blancs tend to be quite racy, lemony, fresh.

It's got real purity and minerality about it, as well.

Bleugh!

No, I'm kidding, it's really nice.

OK, so, we're going to taste our rose. This is 2010.

You should get some subtle red fruits.

But is that just an illusion

when you think you can get strawberries and stuff?

Exactly the same compounds that you get in a strawberry.

It's triggering the same recognition in your olfactory...

It's not just the pinkness that's trig... Ooh, maybe that's nicer.

But I'm looking for a big, exciting sparkling wine experience

for Christmas. And I have a brother-in-law

who is a lavish man of great bounty and loves a proper, muscly,

old-fashioned French champagne, and - frankly - this one,

the first one that we tried, that's got more kind of muscle

and tradition and heft behind it.

Much better than anything I've ever had from France and

I think your brut reserve is just...

That's my Christmas winner.

'Ho-ho! Fighting talk, Giley. But is it a Christmas winner?'

Now, some would say this is the most important drink,

the central drink of the whole season - champagne.

For our Christmas, I'd say this is probably the drink of Christmas Day,

-Christmas Day morning.

-All but the finest champagne is quite acidic

and quite fizzy and it's quite burpy and unless you have something in,

you can't just throw it down on toast and marmalade.

OK, and you've brought along something...

As I would always bring to your house,

-proper smoked salmon, you want proper Jewish smoked salmon.

-Lox?

-Yes.

My father always reckoned it should

be caught by an Englishman in Scotland,

but then smoked by a Jew. It's just more delicate,

you get a fattier product and it goes really well with champagne.

Suddenly...you need champagne.

'No argument about the salmon

'but what will we make of each other's fizz?'

'Xander's gone for something French and expensive

'but I've backed a British bargain.'

I've basically chosen an English sparkling wine

which is made exactly the same way as champagne. It is vintage, it's about

£25 a bottle, I think,

which is what the cheapest non-vintage French stuff costs.

-Yeah, yeah.

-This is the 2008.

All around the front of the tongue - big old fruit,

sort of wham round the chops with a nice Chardonnay taste

-at the front there.

-It's appley.

It's appley.

-It's five years old...

-That is delicious.

-Still got all its fruit.

You have chosen excellently there. I think that is absolutely fantastic.

OK, now, I have gone for the best, I consider,

of the non-vintage champagnes, it's the Bollinger Special Cuvee.

You see, that is one that is actually quite hard to compete against.

Obviously it's delicious, but it's twice as expensive.

I mean, it's delicious, that really is very good.

It's a very good non-vintage champagne

and you can absolutely guarantee that that's going

to taste delicious, but taste them side by side -

you've got so much more character in the Gusbourne.

Just because it's Christmas, just because it's a festive time of year,

when a dwindling number of people are really celebrating the birth of Christ

and more people are just having a good old party time

in the middle of winter, then you've got to celebrate something

-and I think you can be celebrating Britishness.

-I congratulate you on that, I think that's brilliant.

'Victory is mine.

'My home-grown sparkling wine was half the price of Xander's champagne,

'a triumph.'

'That fizz is so delicious, though, we might find ourselves in need

'of an entirely different sort of drink the morning after.

'A Boxing Day curative, if you see what I'm saying,

'to make it all better.'

'But whose hangover cure will hit the spot? I'm championing the Bull Shot.'

-I like to float an egg yolk on it.

-Oh, God!

I'm fairly certain that used to be done and I might be wrong.

It's basically a man's drink.

It's men like Marlon Brando, Joan Crawford...

You know, proper, hard-drinking dead people like Hemingway

and Fitzgerald. They knew that if you wanted to get absolutely hammered

and then bring yourself round again in the morning,

and live to the ripe-old age of 42,

the thing to do was to have a Bull Shot in the morning.

'A Bull Shot is made with vodka, beef consomme,

'Tabasco and Worcester sauce.

'The finishing touch is an egg yolk for a protein hit.'

-And then down in one.

-Yeah.

-Merry Boxing Day.

-Merry Boxing Day to you.

-Did you break your egg?

-I did, yeah.

-I'm glad.

-What do you feel about the drink you just had?

I tell you what, my day can only get better.

I think this is an altogether better drink.

We know it quite well, it's the Bloody Mary.

-I'm going to go one part vodka to two parts tomato juice.

-OK.

We're making quite a big jug of this

because obviously there are two of us.

'Everyone's got their own recipe for a Bloody Mary,

'but mine has beef consomme, Fino sherry

'and horseradish, as well as all the usual ingredients.'

Talk among yourselves.

Shall we plug a bit of celery in there? Go on.

It's quite cool on the side of my slightly hung-over temple.

That is a sensation, isn't it?

It's like having a sort of green dancing girl kissing your ear

while you have a drink.

Look, there isn't any competition at all. Roll on Boxing Day.

-I'll drink this stuff.

-Brilliant.

'We've got our hangover cure, so we should settle on our wine.

'Now, we went to great lengths

'to find the contenders for Christmas lunch.

'Well, I did, anyway. I crossed the Channel.

'But there's only one way to find out which wine will win it -

'taste them with the turkey.'

'Selfless research for the greater good, Giley.'

A lot of unnecessary guff is talked about matching wine,

as if there were a billion flavours of wine,

and for most people there's a handful.

I went to Calais, because Christmas at yours,

usually there's delicious claret on the table.

I've worked on the principle that

the French have kept the best stuff for themselves.

You can go to French supermarkets

-and find really quite nice wines, inexpensively.

-Oh, can you?

-Yes, you can!

-Then I invite you to try this.

Chateau Sociando-Mallet coming in at only a shade under £20.

-Now, what are you getting there?

-That's 2011?

I think in 2021 that might be quite nice.

You don't want to drink too much and if you're going to drink only a few units,

you want to watch your units at our age.

You might as well make them nice units. That's my thing.

If I'm being entirely honest, I'd see that as a waste of unit.

Now, do you want to try this?

-OK.

-I've gone for a Lebanese wine, Chateau Musar. I mean...

How much would this cost?

Well, the trouble is we've had to buy it now, you know.

So you're buying a vintage wine to drink now.

-You're going...

-Don't make excuses, how much money...?

-It's 52 quid!

-52 quid.

I would say the answer probably lies somewhere between these, actually.

I think this was probably...

This was a step too far. I think that's good.

It shows that throwing money at the problem wasn't going to win.

'So, a goalless draw on the wine for lunch, then.'

'Though I consider that a moral victory.

'Generally speaking, claret is a good fit for Christmas dinner.'

-Wa-hey! That's perfectly...

-That's not bad.

-That's wonderfully...

'Next, wine of the fortified kind.

'Port comes from Slovenia. No, it doesn't, it come from Portugal

'and it's a festive institution with Stilton.'

'It's wine that's fortified with brandy before it has finished fermenting.

'The brandy kills off the yeast, so not all the grapes' sugar

'turns to alcohol, which is why it's sweet.'

Well, let's be honest, I think there'll probably only be two people

round our table who'll be remotely interested in the port, that's us.

-So, erm...

-We're trying to find something to go with our Stilton, aren't we?

-We're looking for something to go with...

-Listen, let's wham some of that on our

-..a blue veiny cheese.

Wine to drink with cheese is hard, particularly blue cheese. People love to drink...

English people love to drink red wine with cheese and they just don't go.

I think it brings out all the tannins in a really bad way. You really want sweet stuff.

We have the 20-year-old tawny port.

It sounds nice.

-That smells Christmassy.

-I mean, that's really quite a...

Yes, it does have that cheap, nasty "nyaigh" to it, doesn't it?

-I actually quite like it!

-Right!

Now, the late-bottled vintage spends a long time in cask,

then it goes into the bottle,

but it doesn't really mature in the bottle beyond that.

I'm not really convinced by the late-bottled vintage,

I'm sorry to say.

I think we're going to press on and try the 1996 vintage.

See...

Now, what we're hoping is that this being the...

Unquestionably, the poshest of these ports will be the nicest.

Mmm!

It's got a treacly, charcoaly sort of a flavour.

Has it? Exactly. I'm quite reassured, that is really good.

Thank God.

'Vintage port it is.'

'Just like wine and champagne, vintage port is made from the grapes

'of the year on the bottle, rather than a blend of different wines.'

'You can get your hands on one this age for about £35.

'We've been drinking port since the 17th century,

'which is why many of the producers are British.'

'A tradition well worth continuing.

'Like we need any more booze at this point on Christmas Day,

'let's have a look at something we all have

'at the back of the drinks cupboard.'

'It's the sticky issue of liqueurs.'

So, basically, the rationale for a Christmas liqueur

is that it's so awful, you'd only want to drink it once a year.

If then. Do you know what? This used to be made of avocado pears.

That's why it's called advocaat?

No longer, that's not avocado, they now make it with egg yolk.

Have a bit of that.

It's basically liquid cake.

-Wash your mouth out with a cleansing Baileys.

-OK.

-That's good eating.

-There's no arguing with that.

It's delicious. I mean, that's the most fantastic pudding.

-There's some arguing with THAT, I think.

-Ah!

-Drambuie.

-Yeah.

-It tastes medicinal.

-It has a, erm...

Yeah, it definitely tastes like a sort of cough mixture,

-a kind of Fisherman's Friend.

-Cointreau.

I have to be honest, that's...only going to be good in a cocktail.

Let's have some of this fine drink, here - limoncello.

Eugh!

So, all these old favourites brought out from the dusty recesses

of my drinks cupboard.

We've gone for the one we knew we were going to go for, haven't we?

-The delicious...

-The Irish cream liqueur.

-Mm-mm-mm.

-OK, there we go.

-Cheers.

'There's only one drink to go in our Christmas dozen.

'The wassail bowl of hot cider punch.'

'Sadly, we won't be making it with the apples we squashed ourselves.

'Our cider isn't ready yet.'

So now we're going to fill our fantastic wassail bowl

that you see there, which was turned from a single piece of sycamore.

You know, wassailing is like a...

It's a synonym for having a good time at Christmas.

The Tennyson poem the Morte d'Arthur,

they all gather round the wassail bowl, and we're going to fill

the wassail bowl with a lovely, mulled, warmed cider drink.

-How many of these bottles are we putting in there?

-We need two litres.

'We're using a traditional scrumpy-style cider with cloves,

'nutmeg, cinnamon and some sugar.

'Long ago, when people went wassailing

'to ask their lord for Christmas hospitality

'they'd sing so they wouldn't be mistaken for beggars.'

# We wish you a merry Christmas

# We wish you a merry Christmas... #

'Things got rowdy if they didn't get what they wanted.

'That's where the carol We Wish You A Merry Christmas comes from.'

# Good tidings we bring to you and your king

# We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year... #

'The modern-day equivalents of wassailers

'are in fine voice and they're probably thirsty.

'I tell you, it's not figgy pudding they're after.'

You try it.

-Looks like a beef consomme.

-Oh, that is good. That's delicious.

That is delicious. It's really lovely,

-it would go really nicely with a mince pie or something like that.

-Yeah.

'Better dish out the booze. They won't go until they've got some.'

# We wish you a merry Christmas

# We wish you a merry Christmas

# We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

# Good tidings we bring

# To you and your king

# We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year

# We won't go until we've got some

# We won't go until we've got some

# We won't go until we've got some So bring some out here

# Good tidings we bring To you and your king

# We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year. #

There we are. Thank you very, very much, everyone.

That was wonderful.

Ah! Thank you all so much. A very happy Christmas to you all.

ALL: Happy Christmas!

-Cheers.

-Cheers.

Well, Giles, the fire is crackling in the grate, the halls are decked.

All is safely gathered in.

Do you know what is good about it this year?

We've actually, for once, we've really got a proper schedule of booze.

Yes, for once we're not just going to get drunk

on whatever happens to be at hand.

And we've had so much fun just putting these things together.

We've got 12 drinks at Christmas, 12 little miracles.

Normally, Christmas is just a bit of a blur,

there isn't proper structure to it.

The only day that has any structure is Christmas Day,

but this year I think we can differentiate a bit. We can...

I think that by having 12 drinks into which so much thought has been put,

it's going to end up a blur.

I think it's bedtime now. Good night.

-Happy Christmas.

-Happy Christmas.

-Good night, Giley.

-Night-night, Xander.

Happy Christmas.