From Fairy Lights to Quinn’s Sauce
Via midwinter festivities, real magic moments, wolves, Romania, garlic & antibiotic resistance
Dearest Gentle Reader
How are you all on what I have decided is Week 1 of my midwinter festivities? I’m starting slowly, I have put up every available fairy light in my sitting room and am considering purchasing more. If the cat stays still too long he may find himself wrapped in these particularly darling copper ones with the sweetest tiny lights and a convenient battery pack. Don’t worry, I wouldn’t do such a thing, even it it wasn’t animal cruelty, he would, quite rightly, bite me. I have also had 3 mince pies and a pack of dark chocolate bottomed Lebkuchen and prepared a veritable feast of festive food folklore to share with my wonderful friends on social media from 1-24 December. That seems enough for now at least.
Also I have to confess that something something took away momentarily my lovely sparkly festive celebration feelings. It actually did more than that, it made me angry. Now I am rarely angry, I am often miffed, irritated, annoyed and grumpy about all the generally small rubbish things that happen in life, but angry is a big step for me. The thing that has made me full of this unusual emotion is Coca-Cola, or at the very least the advertising of it. I’m not anti soft drinks, although I’m more of a fizzy squash kind of a woman but this time they have stepped over the line.
Their current advertising slogan in the UK is ‘There’s magic when we eat together, make your family meals magical with Coca-Cola.’ I was so livid when I saw it. I’m probably over-reacting but eating together really is such a magical thing. Not just for families, it brings people, even strangers together. I spent hours interviewing wonderful storytellers and amazing food writers and one of the things that resonated with everyone was how food brings people together and how it can break down misconceptions and prejudices between different peoples.
Food memories and shared food experiences can be visceral and they so often bring comfort especially when we can’t eat together. The pandemic showed us that if nothing else. Scents of food in the street can take you back to a time when you felt absolutely safe and loved. Eating together is special and magical and the concept of it should certainly not be used, by a soft drink that can dissolve metal overnight, to make money.
There, my venting is over. I’m not naive, I know lots of people don’t have big happy family eating together memories but most people do have experiences that actually feel magical. I feel like we should try to reclaim the word back from them if nothing else. It doesn’t have to be big magic, it can be a tiny thing like the lift you get when you are totally relaxed and your cat purrs by your ear. It can be when you taste something you grew in a window box. It can be when you see a bush covered in frozen spiderweb that looks like glistening spun silver. It can be when your team scores a total unexpected goal and the whole crowd rises to its feet.
It can be those precious 10 minutes of peace that you get to yourself every day. It can be when you leave for work in the morning and it is so cold and clear and the moon seems to take up the whole sky. It can be when you get to drink a whole cup of tea at the perfect temperature. It can be when you bite into your absolute favourite food. It can be when seeing the person you love still makes you catch your breath even if just for a moment. It can be when your new book transports you to another world and keeps you there for hours. It can be any or none of those things, you alone know when you experience a moment of magic.
Having insisted on berating you with my opinion, I feel you deserve some interesting folklore. I mean, everyone deserves interesting folklore, whenever they want it, but you perhaps deserve it slightly more now. How much do you know about St Andrew? How much do you know about Romania? What about your garlic knowledge, is it up to date? Perhaps you know a little about all of them but did you know that they all get together on 29 November to become the event that is St Andrew’s Eve?
St Andrew, as well as being the patron saint of Scotland is also the patron saint of several other countries including Romania. He is also the patron saint of wolves in case you didn’t know, this becomes relevant shortly. Now many of us that are interested in folklore as well as anyone who has read anything about Halloween are aware that this was considered the night where the veil between the worlds is at its thinnest, making it a possibility that those from beyond the veil including spirits and ghosts could visit. The popularity of Halloween or Samhain is probably because this date was originally an important Celtic date that travelled across the Atlantic.
The Romanians or at least the peoples that existed in Romania in earlier history were known as Dacians and they considered the end of November to be the end of autumn and start of winter. In this liminal time, the veil between the human world and the spirit world was considered at its weakest. It was also the time when wolves were at their strongest before splitting into smaller packs to survive the winter. Romanian folklore suggests that wolves at this time were so fast and limber they could turn around to see their own tales and could chase anyone to their inevitable death. It was the night that wolves could pass as human meaning that houses need to be protected.
It was also the night that the Strigoi or troubled spirits could rise from the grave and gain vitality from the blood of their victims which is one of the tales from which the myth of vampires came. They were particularly horrid and even if they didnt attack humans it was said they would steal milk from cows or the strength from bulls and bring disease to humans, crops and livestock.
The Romanians felt the need to protect themselves from the wolves and the Strigoi and so used garlic to smear around their doors and window frames as well as other rituals such as not working, not combing their hair or to pronouncing the word "lup" (wolf in Romanian), as these might attract the thirsty wolves. They also prepared garlic based dishes. My favourite ritual has actually become more of a party. This is known as Guarding the Garlic. One house in the community is chosen and young people gather there. Basil & poppy seeds are also sprinkled outside for protection. Young women bring three bulbs of garlic with them and this is deposited in bowl and given to an older woman who guards the garlic bowl whilst the young people dance and eat the night away. Once the dawn breaks they return back to their own homes and all get a bulb of garlic to take with them. This bulb now possesses protective and healing properties for the next year.
On St Andrews Day itself there is another joyous ritual you can even consider trying yourself: if you go to the apple or cherry orchard and cut a twig from a tree and then keep it in a glass of water in a warm place in your home that you will have a year of comfort and wellbeing if the twig blossoms before New Year’s.
I feel we need both a garlic remedy and recipe for you today as garlic is wonderful, tastes amazing and even if you have no need to protect yourself against wolves and the Strigoi, it can’t hurt to have some hanging around if only to make a more modern recipe like Spaghetti El Aglio & Olio. It’s a wonderfully tasty, filling yet frugal recipe and there is as a bonus a lot more garlic lore on the same page should you be interested.
However our remedy today is actually pretty exciting. I know I am occasionally snarky but this remedy actually has possibilities in breaking through some antibiotic resistance: its known as “Bald’s eyesalve,” named because of its source in the medieval medical text Bald’s Leechbook. It is pretty disgusting although it starts off ok with onions, garlic, a splash of wine, and some cow bile. It's the cow bile that puts me off. The mixture is amazingly effective particularly against bacterial bio-films.
We are returning to our book from my last letter for our vintage garlic recipe: The Practice of Cookery adapted to the Business of Everyday Life by Mrs Dalgairns. I loved this piquant sounding sauce but must admit that having to track down walnut pickle and mushroom pickle might be tricky.
With that, Gentle Reader, I must bring this letter to a close. Please don’t hesitate to get in touch via the comments or via any of my social media profiles/my website . If you have enjoyed this and would like to read further such nonsense and have not yet subscribed, please don’t hesitate to subscribe for free at the button below. You’d be very welcome and it would be a joy to write to you.
Great essay, and I agree with you on appreciating the every day kind of magic. I guess cocoa cola is just trying to hijack the word and jump on the bandwagon lol. Now that it’s Christmas season, the word ‘magical’ gets used a lot.
Indeed, during my many years investigating and assisting with paranormal problems that plagued people, it is at this time of year betwixt All Hallows Eve and New Year's Eve is when phenomena was at its peak.
I do not have a ready answer for this, perhaps emotional residue that is activated by the season and energies from individuals during this time are at higher levels.