Make your own
Wassail
Make your own Wassail
In normal times around Twelfth Night the Broadwood Men would be Wassailing the apple trees in the orchard at Maplehurst with JB’s cider, some toast, a bonfire and all our friends; starting with dancing at the White Horse and ending back there with music and singing. However, these are not normal times and while we hope to be able to share some kind of Wassail with you for Twelfth Night we also thought you might want to have a little wassail of your own, so here are some ideas.
Now, the Broadwood wassail is an example of an orchard visiting wassail where we wassail an apple tree, although as it’s just an excuse for an outdoor party then to be honest pretty well anything will do, so when we say ‘apple tree’ just substitute whatever you’re wassailing.
What you’ll need:
An orchard, apple tree or substitute
Cider. JB’s for preference but others are available
Some cold toast
A bowl for soaking the toast in some of the cider
Something to make a noise with
Some stout sticks for driving out evil spirits
Some virgins (optional) or children
A fire and/or lanterns to brighten up your wassail location
The Wassail
This assumes you’re wassailing a single apple tree, but feel free to adapt.
Start by lighting your lanterns and / or fire (take all the sensible precautions associated with a fire, keep any stray morris dancers in tattered jackets well away from it)
Have a bit of a procession to your tree, make a thing of it.
Once you get to your chosen tree it’s important to let any evil spirits lurking in the tree know who’s in charge, so bash the trunk with sticks to drive out any spirits that may be lurking there.
Next, pour some cider over the roots (it might be worth checking the quality of the cider at this point) to enrich the soil and to help to ensure a good crop in the coming year.
At this point our Wassail M/C, Dick, would normally have an apple-related anecdote to share. Now, he’s not going to be at your Wassail, but here’s an example of the kind of thing for you to use (if you’re going to read this out it’s worth taking a sip of cider first, no-one wants to be thirsty while they’re reading). This is an account of the effects of weather taken from ‘The Cuckoo in June - Tales of a Sussex Orchard’ by David Atkins:
Hail
When hail strikes a fruit farm it is devastating. In 1958 we had an excellent
crop and had just started picking when, on 5 th September, the black clouds
piled high and the hail crashed down. It was so heavy that, instead of
bouncing on the grass, the hailstones buried themselves in the ground. The
hail killed cats, dented cars, crashed through greenhouses and made holes in
corrugated asbestos roofs.
The week before the storm a glasshouse grower had been on television and
remarked that unlike other farmers he was immune to weather changes.
Perhaps the gods heard him! Every pane of glass was smashed and all his crops ruined.
Now pour some cider into the bowl (again, it’s worth checking the quality of your cider if there’s any doubt) and soak or dip the toast in the cider and finally place the soaked toast in the branches of the tree to feed the robins who will carry off any remaining bad spirits. This task is traditionally performed by one or more virgins and/or children.
Now everybody recites the following verse:
First verse:
Here’s to thee old Apple Tree,
May’st thou bud. May’st thou blow,
Hats full, caps full, full quarter sacks full,
HOORAY!
After the first verse everyone makes a lot of noise to scare off evil spirits, but you might not have got rid of them all so there’s another:
Second verse:
Here stands a good old Apple Tree,
Stand fast root, Bear well top,
Every twig apples big, Every bough apples enou’,
Hats full, caps full, four and twenty caps full,
HOORAY!
After the second verse everyone makes even more noise with whatever they can - hooters, football rattles, etc - to finally drive off any remaining evil spirits
Finally all sing the Wassail song, especially the chorus! Here's a video as a reminder of how it goes
Wassail Song (to the tune ‘Gloucestershire Wassail’)
Now here's to the bull with one crumpled horn,
May God send our master a good crop of corn,
And a good crop of corn that may we all see,
With a wassailing bowl we'll drink to thee.
Chorus:
Wassail, Wassail all over the town,
Our toast it is white and our cider is brown,
Our bowl it is made from the white maple tree,
And our wassailing bowl we'll drink to thee.
And here's to old Blossom and to her left ear,
May God send our master a good keg of beer,
And a good keg of beer that may we all see,
With a Wassailing bowl we'll drink to thee,
(Chorus)
And here's to this place where the apple trees grow,
To make a good pie, or the cider to flow,
Or the cider to flow that may we all see,
With a wassailing bowl we'll drink to thee.
(Chorus)
And here's to the maids in their lilly white smocks,
Who creep down the stairs and pull back the locks,
Who creep down the stairs and pull back the pin,
To let us jolly wassailers in.
And that’s it
That’s the end of the orchard part of the Wassail, but of course you can carry on celebrating with music and song and cider.
While having your own Wassail is great fun we do hope that next time you’ll be able to come to ours!
The Broadwood Men