Wine is part of people’s lives British royal familyeven if each of its members takes it in their own way. King Charles’ beloved grandmother, the Queen Mother, always found somewhere to have a drink at her home … hand, both to toast and to forget. He offered his visitors a gin and tonic as an aperitif, red Bordeaux during meals, and gin with Dubonnet and Martini, which were his favorite cocktails.
Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon He insisted that the others drink, perhaps to make the evening more enjoyable. “Let’s have another drink” was his best-known phrase, which gives the title to a book by the historian Gareth Russell.
After one of these endless meals at her residence, Royal Lodge, Elizabeth II’s mother asked her longtime butler, William Tallon, if next time they could have a little more gin, to which he replied: “Perhaps we should ask for it to be sent to us in a tanker truck“.
King Juan Carlos I, in “Reconciliation”, still remembers that, during his first visit to London, at the age of nine, “the future queen mother drank gin and tonic before dinner”. Having a reputation for enjoying all types of drinks, there was a bottle of sherry in the bar cabinet: “Sherry before dinner” as the British high society said, although it did not need to stimulate one’s appetite.
Elizabeth II preferred moderation
Elizabeth II, unlike her mother and Princess Margaret, preferred moderation. Even though the Queen never liked wine, sherry was a common aperitif at palace dinners since George IV. It is quite likely that Her Majesty personally valued sherry wine since, just as her great-great-grandmother, Queen Victoria, commissioned it in 1895, she also granted the company John Harvey & Sons Ltd., which bottled sherry in England, the seal of official supplier for being one of the favorite wines of the Royal Household. Mainly the Bristol Cream, a sweet wine that the monarchy drank from small glasses.
The Royal Family Wine Committee
The UK’s leading sherry expert is Ben Howkinsa sort of living legend who for twenty years has been one of the privileged few to be part of the Royal Wine Committee of the Royal House. The person responsible for “carefully” selecting all the wines served at lunches and dinners shares his memories and feelings exclusively for ABC. enter Buckingham Palace for the first time: “It was October 29, 1986, almost forty years ago; an exciting, disturbing and astonishing experience. He had just been invited to join what could be considered the most coveted wine committee in the world. “There were only six of us, mostly wine merchants who had the long-awaited Royal Warrant from Her Majesty the Queen.”
Carlos and Camilla at a wine tasting in 2019
At that time, Elizabeth II was fifty-nine years old and there were still seven years before the official residence of the monarchy, where the main wine reserves are located, would be opened to the public. “We entered Buckingham Palace through the Ambassadors’ Entrance, a rather grand name for what was essentially the side door. After all, technically we were merchants“. Then they walked through endless corridors: “The impressive cellars are located in the basement and the temperature is controlled. All wines selected for consumption they are tasted blind and in silence”, since they come from companies that manage the committee members.
“We would then give our notes to the secretary in a low voice so that others could not hear and be influenced, and then it would be decided which wines would be purchased for the royal cellar.” The wines served by the Crown do not always come from numbered bottles; It is striking that some can be bought for a few euros in supermarkets.
Meals at Buckingham
Mr. Howkins, elegantly mannered, sober and precise in his words, born in rural England, will never forget what meals were like at Buckingham: “They generally took place in the billiard room or in the Chinese room, on the first floor. It was always a privilege; the menus were in French, I still remember itand we happily enjoyed the wines we had chosen.
“During my twenty years on the Committee, we were promoted mainly because Wine was a very important part of the palace machineryfor he undoubtedly helped to entertain his guests at the four principal residences: Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle, Balmoral and Sandringham. And towards the end, they greeted us at the door of the Privy Purse.
Elizabeth II toasts in 2004 with President Horst Kohler
Did Elizabeth II like sherry? “Honestly, I don’t know what you thought of its taste.” Brands like La Ina and Bristol Cream were probably there but I have no information after 2007 when I retired. The reality is that very little sherry is consumed at Buckingham Palace and other royal residences. The boom time came when King George IV proclaimed that he would only drink sherry, in the early 19th century. We say goodbye with a certain nostalgia to an era that also remains engraved in the memory of the families of Jerez whose ancestors were winegrowers.
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