Tag: Rum

Madeira Mondays: Discovering an 18th Century Energy Drink

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Those who have been reading this blog for a while know that I like to try out historical recipes. Sometimes, my culinary experiments go pretty well: like the time that I tried to make a frothy whipped syllabub. Sometimes, they don’t go well at all: like the time I made an absolutely vile warm rum drink called ‘flip’. And, sometimes, these experiments succeed wildly, and this wild success was what I experienced when I made ‘switchel’ for the first time yesterday. Damn! This drink was excellent. A refreshing, invigorating, slightly tart and slightly sweet, healthy and easy-to-make historical drink that I’m thrilled to have stumbled across.

I made this drink in part as a celebration of some goods news: the historical fiction novel that I’ve been working on was long-listed for the Mslexia Novel Award! For those who might not be familiar, Mslexia is a popular magazine in the UK, and they run an international competition every two years for debut novel manuscripts by female authors. It was a tremendous honor for my manuscript to be long-listed. Some amazing novelists, and in particular historical novelists, have won or been long or short-listed for this award in previous years (Imogen Hermes Gowar who wrote The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock, for instance), so it was a real thrill to have my manuscript long-listed. As a poet who has been transitioning to fiction writing these last few years, it was also a major confidence boost to be recognized for my fiction, as well.

And speaking of poetry…I also made switchel to celebrate receiving the first copies of my brand new poetry pamphlet – Anastasia, Look in the Mirror – which will be published by Stewed Rhubarb Press next month on July 2nd! I can’t wait to share this book with you, and I have several posts lined up already focused on: what it’s about, how I researched and wrote it, etc. So stay tuned for that! For now, back to switchel. 

What exactly is ‘switchel’?

‘Switchel’ is a summery drink that was widely enjoyed in 18th century America, but versions of it date back much, much earlier. It’s made typically with water mixed with apple cider vinegar and ginger, and then sweetened with something (like molasses or honey or maple syrup). It’s a drink that thirsty American farmers would enjoy after a hot day harvesting the hay, thus its nickname of ‘haymaker’s punch’. It’s a drink meant to quench the thirst and revive the body, which is why I think of it as an historical ‘energy drink’.

It goes by several other names besides ‘switchel’. You could call it: aqua forte, ginger-water, haymaker’s punch, Yankee beverage, or (my personal favorite) swizzle.

How do you make it?

This is one of the best things about switchel: it’s super easy to make!

The version that I made combines two recipes: this recipe from the Townsend’s YouTube Channel (a favorite channel of mine, as frequent readers of this blog will know!) and a recipe from Forgotten Drinks of Colonial New England by Corin Hirsch (a very fun book if you’re interested in food and old New England-y things).

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Here’s what I used:

  • 5-6 cups of cold water
  • Quarter cup of maple syrup
  • Quarter cup of lemon juice
  • Half a tablespoon of powdered ginger

I mixed all of those together in a pitcher and that’s it.

As I mentioned earlier, it’s often made with apple cider vinegar, but I didn’t have any of that on hand and Townsend had recommended that you could use lemon juice instead. But I’d be eager to try it out with apple cider vinegar. And for the maple syrup, you could also use honey or molasses.

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I poured some into a jar with a slice of lemon and there you go!

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What does it taste like?

In a word: refreshing!

I was very uncertain about adding the ginger, but honestly this tastes like a delicious mixture of ginger-beer and lemonade. It would be an incredibly refreshing drink after working outside on a hot day. My partner and I drank all of it very quickly and it’s so simple to make that I might make more very soon. (It would also make for an excellent mixer to go with vodka, I think, or rum…).

I’m not at all surprised that its popularity is apparently on the rise! According to this article from The Guardian, modern versions of this drink are becoming popular with: ‘the types of people who ride vintage bicycles, raise chickens and keep bees on their roof.’ I laughed a lot when I read that because while I don’t do any of those things – I have no bike, I don’t eat chickens, and I’d be too scared to keep bees – I probably fall loosely within that ‘hipster’ demographic.

Whether switchel is actually ‘threatening to dethrone kombucha as the next hip health trend’, as the article predicts, remains to be seen. But if it does become as popular as kombucha, I think it is deserved!

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Have you ever heard of switchel? I would not be surprised if it is already a trend in America and I just haven’t heard of it! Here in the UK, I’ve not seen it anywhere. But I would definitely buy it if I did.

If you try making your own switchel, I would be so delighted to hear about it! (As you can see from the recipe above, it’s extremely simple to make and you could maybe even rustle up a version of it with things already in your kitchen!).

Recommended Reading/Viewing:

PS Today’s Featured Image is ‘Harvest Rest’ by George Cole c. 1865

‘Madeira Mondays’ is a series of blog posts exploring Early American history and historical fiction. I’m not a historian, but an author and poet who is endlessly fascinated by this time period. I am also currently writing/researching a novel set during the American Revolution and recently finished a Doctorate of Fine Art looking at how creative writers access America’s eighteenth-century past. 

Follow the blog for a new post every Monday and thanks for reading!

 

 

 

Madeira Mondays: A Forgotten 18th Century Drink

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Last week, I received two very good pieces of news. One I cannot talk about publicly yet (ohhhh secret!) but the other I can happily announce is that I have a new poetry book coming out! My second poetry pamphlet will be published later this year with Scottish indie press, Stewed Rhubarb. They specialize in publishing spoken word poetry and as a spoken word poet myself, it was the perfect fit! The book has poems about early American history, about sex, about literature…basically, all the stuff I’m interested in! (Can you tell I’m excited?). I can’t wait to work with Stewed Rhubarb, and with my fabulous editor Katie Ailes, on this book and I’ll share lots more info. when we’re closer to publication day.

But I wanted to celebrate the publication news this week by making an 18th century drink. Since it was a chilly February day, I chose a warm drink called ‘Flip’. I’m not going to include the full recipe here because (spoiler alert) I found this drink pretty vile, BUT I will tell you what it is, how I made it, and here’s a link to an excellent video with step-by-step instructions of how you can make it too, if it seems like your sort of thing (It was definitely not mine!). Jas Townsend, the re-enactor who makes it in the video, seems to really enjoy his though so…maybe it just wasn’t for me?

So, what is ‘Flip’?

The 1890’s had the gimlet. The 1990’s had the Cosmo. In the 1690’s and even the 1790’s, it was the creamy flip that ruled the bar…

– Forgotten Drinks of Colonial New England by Corin Hirsch

Flip is a hot, frothy drink that is a blend of ale, rum, some sort of sweetener (molasses or sugar) and sometimes eggs and cream. It’s also usually spiced with nutmeg and/or ginger, and it was very popular in 18th century America. It popped up in American taverns in the 1690’s and was still popular during the Revolutionary War. Food writer Corin Hirsch, in the book quoted above, found one instance of a tavern in Holden, Massachusetts, who charged more during the Revolutionary War for their Flip than they did for a bed. A mug of ‘New England Flip’ was 9 Dollars, versus a bed in the common boarding room for women, 2 shillings! Either those sleeping arrangements were really bad, or their flip was really good, or both.

How do you make it?

I have to admit that making Flip was kind of fun because you are meant to pour the drink between two separate pitchers until it is blended. So I mixed an egg and some spices in one bowl, then heated up some ale separately, and then added them together in these two pitchers – pouring back and forth until it was creamy.

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The two pitchers I used to make my (pretty dreadful) ‘Flip’

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Pouring the mixture from one pitcher to another to mix it. (Even the flowers in this picture look sad. They probably don’t like Flip either!)

I was vaguely following along with the Townsend video linked above and also there’s a recipe for it in Forgotten Drinks of Colonial New England. In any case, the resulting mixture was creamy-ish, but there were itty bitty chunks of cooked egg inside it, which I suppose I could have strained out. But I also did not like the smell of it: the hot, yeasty smell of the beer, mixed with the nutmeg and ginger, mixed with the egg.

But I think where I really went wrong is that in the 18th century Flip was heated up a second time (after you’d mixed the drink) by plunging a hot fire poker into the middle of it. The poker heated it (of course), but also added burnt flavors. I would imagine this might work better than what I did, which was put the whole thing back on the stovetop briefly, once I’d mixed it all together, just to get it warm again. By not using an actual fire poker, you lose some of that fire flavor, which was probably part of what made the drink special.

What did it taste like?

Not nice, you guys.

Even though I drank it from a fantastic Bernie Sanders ‘Feel the Bern’ mug, that was not enough to save this drink from tasting really, really bad to me.

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For one thing, it was pretty sweet. I tasted the sugar definitely and also rum has its own sweetness…all of that together made for a thick, HEAVY, brownish drink that actually turned my stomach.

Looking back on it, I’m not really sure why I picked Flip in the first place, other than the fact that it looked fun to pour the drink between the two pitchers. I’m not a beer drinker, and I don’t love rum, so I’m not sure why I thought I would enjoy those two things heated up and mixed together with an egg. I would still try it again if someone else made it who knew what they were doing, but I think this experiment was probably doomed from the outset!

Nevertheless, I am glad that I tried it, because now I will know what it is if I ever run across it in a historical source. And my stomach will turn at the memory of making this forgotten concoction from the 18th century. Which I will not be resurrecting again any time soon!

Recommended Reading/Viewing:

Forgotten Drinks of Colonial New England: From Flips & Rattle-Skulls to Switchel and Spruce Beer by Corin Hirsch

‘Popular Drink Fallen into Obscurity- ‘Flip’ from the 1820s’ on Townsends YouTube Channel

For an 18th century drink that I definitely did enjoy, check out my recipe for whipped syllabub!

(Today’s Featured Image is an 18th century oil painting, ‘Young Couple in a Rural Tavern’, by Giacomo Francesco Cipper)

‘Madeira Mondays’ is a series of blog posts exploring Early American history and historical fiction. I’m not a historian, but an author and poet who is endlessly fascinated by this time period. I am also currently writing/researching a novel set during the American Revolution and recently finished a Doctorate of Fine Art looking at how creative writers access America’s eighteenth-century past. Follow the blog for a new post every Monday and thanks for reading!