Smoking Bishop
Mulled wine with whole roasted citrus that has been stuck with cloves
City/Region: England
Time Period: 1836 | 1868
At the end of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, Scrooge has had a change of heart and tells his poor clerk, Bob Cratchit, that he wants to help him.
“...we will discuss your affairs this very afternoon over a Christmas bowl of smoking bishop, Bob!”
But what is this festive drink?
Smoking bishop is a version of mulled wine, very appropriate for Christmas with plenty of spices and citrus. This recipe comes mostly from an 1836 recipe from the delightfully pseudo-named Dick Humelbergius Secundus, with a couple of changes as suggested by the esteemed Eliza Acton. It’s so Christmassy with all of the spices, and the roasted whole citrus adds a bit of zest to it that separates it from other mulled wines. It’s a perfect cozy drink for the holiday season.
“Make several incisions into the rind of a lemon; stick cloves in these incisions, and roast the said lemon by the fire. Put small but equal quantities of cinnamon, mace, cloves, and allspice, and a race of ginger, into a saucepan, with half a pint of water; let it boil until it be reduced one half. Boil one bottle of port wine; burn a portion of the spirit out of it, by applying a lighted taper to the saucepan which contains it. 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 nobs 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, sweeten it to your taste, and serve it up with the lemon and spice floating in it.”
“Bishop is frequently made with a Seville orange stuck with cloves and slowly roasted, and its flavour to many tastes is infinitely finer than that of the lemon.”
Ingredients:
- 2 Meyer lemons
- 1 orange
- 24 whole cloves
- 2 cinnamon sticks
- 1/4 teaspoon ground mace*
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
- 1 inch ginger, peeled and sliced
- 1 1/4 cup (300 ml) water
- 1/2 cup (65 g) powdered sugar
- Juice of 1/2 lemon
- 1 750 ml bottle ruby port*
*See notes below.
Instructions:
- Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C). Line a baking sheet with foil or parchment.
- Cut 8 small, shallow incisions into each piece of citrus, and insert a clove into each cut. Set them on the prepared baking sheet and bake for 80 to 90 minutes. They’ll be very soft to the touch.
- Once the citrus is roasted, stir together the water and all of the spices in a small saucepan. Bring to a simmer and reduce by half, about 15 to 20 minutes.
- While it reduces, in a separate, larger pot, bring the port to a light simmer. If you wish to burn away some of the spirit as the historical recipe states (though why you’d wish to do so is beyond me), carefully light it with a lighter. Be very careful if you do this, it is very flammable. It’s probably safer all around to just keep all of the spirit in the port.
- When the port simmers, add in the water and spices and the roasted citrus and simmer for another 10 minutes. Whisk in the lemon juice and sugar until the sugar is dissolved.
- Take it off the heat and serve it forth right away, or you can let it sit covered in the fridge overnight to let the flavors really develop, which is what I did. The next day, reheat it until it’s “smoking”, add rum or brandy if desired, and serve it forth.
Notes
- Mace comes from the outside of a nutmeg seed and tastes similar to nutmeg with notes of cinnamon and black pepper. It's used in a lot of historical recipes and is definitely worth getting.
- Curiada no longer carries the exact ruby port I use in the video, but there is a great alternative in my curated collection.
- Link to mace: https://amzn.to/3SMkVJ5
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