Make a Ronnie James Dio festive drink this Christmas
Here at Far Out, we advise you to drink responsibly this holiday season. But if you’re looking to swig some booze, famous rock stars might not be the most level-headed people to follow this Christmas.
It’s funny, then, that you could do exactly that with the 1988 cookbook rock ‘N’ Roll Cuisine. Everyone from Rod Stewart to Debbie Harry contributed a recipe to this strange footnote in rock history, and there’s even a recipe for Ozzy Osbourne’s chicken curry (I would pay top dollar to see Ozzy try and describe what chicken curry is, much less make it in front of me).
One figure who gets in on the fun is legendary heavy metal vocalist Ronnie James Dio. The Rainbow and Black Sabbath frontman has an appropriately gnarly contribution to the cookbook: roast suckling pig in bread sauce served with cups from the wassail bowl.
Now, if you are like me, you have no idea what wassail is. It’s a hot cider drink that comes part and parcel with the English folk tradition of wassailing (as the only current American on staff at Far Out, I feel like I’m horribly under-qualified to speak on the tradition of wassailing). Dio was a famous history buff, so when he pulls out a wassail recipe, rest assured that it has quite a backstory to it.
According to the book, the wassail recipe that Dio has is more than just your run-of-the-mill cider. Instead, it’s the same wassail “prepared by Charles Dickens for the entertainment, on Christmas Eve, at the Charity of Richard Watts, Rochester, Kent, England, 1854.” Now that’s some alcoholic pedigree if I’ve ever heard it. The recipe is as follows:
Wassail Bowl Recipe:
- 1 quart ale
- 1/4 ounce ground nutmeg
- 1/4 ounce grated ginger
- 1/4 ounce grated cinnamon
- 1/2 bottle sherry
- 2 slices toasted bread (1/2 inch thick)
- 1 lemon, juice and peel
- Sugar to taste
- 2 well-baked apples
Method:
- Put ale in a saucepan and cook gently till it foams.
- Then stir in the spices, add the sherry, lemon peel and juice with sugar.
- When sugar is dissolved, set the pan aside on the stove for 20 minutes to infuse.
- Then warm up, pour into punch bowl, let the toast and apples float in this and serve in cups.
While you’re at it, why not jam out to a Christmas classic from Dio while you make his unique yuletide beverage? Check out Dio’s version of ‘God Rest, Ye Merry Gentlemen’ down below.
