![]() While my thoughts about mulled wine took me immediately across the Channel, it’s home here in UK where hot wine has been popular since Victorian days and is mentioned in Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol when Scrooge (at the end of the book when he’s become a reformed, nice man) invites Bob Cratchit to talk over a ‘Christmas bowl of smoking bishop’, a popular mulled wine punch at the time. I’m not sure why I haven’t got round to just booking a flight as it’s somewhere I’ve wanted to go for ages, but I’ve heard the Christmas markets are magical and what a great place that would be to drink gluhwein and eat Sachertorte! We had a great day trip from London by car via the Channel tunnel and not only shopped in the market but indulged in a brilliant lunch at a Michelin starred restaurant.īut if someone were to say they’d send me to any Christmas market to try some local mulled wine, then it would have to be somewhere I haven’t yet visited: Vienna. I went there with Annie and Jerry about 4 years ago. Another popular Christmas market destination is Lille, in northern France. Prague was so beautiful I loved it and have always meant to go back in summer time to see it in a different way. But my first remembered experience of a Christmas market is when Nicola and I went to Prague in December 2005. ![]() I went to the Birmingham one with my daughter a couple of years ago it’s now one of the biggest in Europe. ![]() And it was the Romans back in the 1st century from whom we have the first record of heating spiced wine, bringing their wine and viticulture right across Europe to the borders of Scotland.Īnother popular thing to do at this time of year is take a trip to a Christmas market. In Italy mulled wine is known either as vin brûlé or vino speziato (literally, spicy wine). Of course the Valle d’Aosta is more popular with skiers in the winter and for foodies its proximity to Piemonte, where some of Italy’s best food comes from, makes it an appealing destination. I think it would be great to be in the Dolomites in the winter, with its Germanic influence on their foods bringing pork dishes, breads and fabulous cakes. They even had a fire to stand by and keep warm while you drank it! Thinking apres ski and winter alpine scenes led me to think that I’d never been to Italy in the winter – although I’ve travelled to Italy more than anywhere else. In fact when I was last there, in January 2013, staying with my friends Annie and Jerry, vin chaud (hot wine) was available from stalls in the village’s main road at night. But that led to thoughts of Switzerland, where I’ve spent more time. So thinking of mulled wine around the world, Austria was an obvious place to begin. I did, however, take well to the hot wine – gluhwein (literally, ‘glow wine’ from the hot irons once used for mulling) – and I think I even brought back some bags of spices with a view to making my own. I think the first time I tasted mulled wine was in Austria, site of my first and disastrous attempts at skiing. When Waitrose Cellar got in touch with me last month telling me about their promotion of ‘Mulled Wines Around the World’ and asking if I’d like to write something for it on my blog, my mind immediately turned to winter snow scenes and apres ski ( apres ski because you would never catch me on a ski slope!).
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