Traditional Cuisine: Mead

                                                                   

One very Traditional drink that surprisingly is less common today is mead. This ancient drink that was enjoyed by the Old Norse Vikings is still available today yet somewhat hard to find in the average spirit store.

Called the ancestor of all fermented drinks, mead's history is incredibly old with the earliest archaeological evidence of the production of mead dating around 7000 b.c. and the earliest reference coming from the hymns of the Rigveda, one of the sacred books of the historical Vedic religion and Hinduism dated around 1700–1100 b.c.  The Epic poem Beowulf also references mead and Mead halls.

In the Germanic and Celtic cultures mead was considered a heroic drink. Historically mead in olden times would be drunk in Mead Halls where Scandinavian Kings and their warriors would feast and celebrate heroic deeds with songs sung by bards.

 The commercial selling of mead was obscure until recently due to taxation and regulations governing the ingredients of alcoholic beverages. Some monasteries kept up the old traditions of mead-making as a by-product of beekeeping, especially in areas where grapes could not be grown again giving the world another reason to thank the Catholic Church.

Mead is an alcoholic beverage made by fermenting a solution of honey and water. Quite often it is drunk mulled, that is warmed, and spices and fruit mixed into it.

So whenever you would like to feel more aesthetically traditional, drinking mead would be a good option and while drinking it remember the ancient history of this amazing Traditional beverage.