Red wine warmed and sweetened with honey, perfumed with cinnamon, ginger and cloves, then filtered: a hot, spiced drink taken at the end of a meal or to warm oneself in cold weather.

Why this dish? A festive and comforting drink of the Golden Age, *hipocrás* closed good meals in wealthy homes and the inns that Cervantes so well depicted in *Don Quixote*. For the writer accustomed to the inns of Castile, it was the wine of happy days and full purses.

After a good meal — when fate granted me one — nothing beat a cup of *hipocrás*! I would heat the wine without boiling, melt honey into it, throw in cinnamon, ginger and cloves, then strain it through a tight cloth until clear. Drink it warm, reader: it warms the blood, loosens the tongue, and makes conversation seem wittier than it is. It is the wine of the inns where I saw so many stories born.

How it was made : *Hipocrás* (named after Hippocrates, via the "sleeve of Hippocrates," the cloth bag used to filter it) was widespread throughout Europe from the late Middle Ages to the Baroque era. In Spain, it was sweetened with honey or sugar and richly spiced; it was drunk mainly at the end of a meal. No direct link to Cervantes survives, hence a faithful reconstruction of his era rather than a documented dish from his table.

The contemporary twist : Served warm with a dried bitter orange zest, in small glasses, as a winter alternative to classic mulled wine — the "Quixote mulled wine."

Sources : Ruperto de Nola, *Libro de cozina* (Castilian editions 16th c.) · Francisco Martínez Montiño, *Arte de cocina* (1611)

Miguel de Cervantes · Charactorium