Sweet Somethings

Now that the cold weather is upon us, it seems like a great time to talk about sbiten – a somewhat forgotten, but very old Russian drink made with honey, as well as spices and herbs.

Over the last century and a half, tea drinking has become such a staple of Russian life and culture that it’s difficult to imagine that this wasn’t always the case. Prior to the arrival of cheap Chinese tea (see “The Siberian Tea Road,” Russian Life, May/June 2013), sbiten was actually Russians’ drink of choice (both hot and cold) for at least a few centuries.

Archeological digs around the world have conclusively proven that just about every civilization used honey in its cooking, and eastern Slavs were no exception. The first mentions of sbiten date to twelfth century manuscripts, and the first known recipe was recorded in the sixteenth century Domostroy – an Ivan the Terrible era manual of various household advice and rules. The recipe reflects sbiten’s previously alcoholic nature, and the fact that, back then, it was a rather expensive drink, served in special establishments. The recipe reads as follows:

To make the sbiten, take a bottle of wine, a bottle of vinegar, a bottle of beer, a quarter of pepper, a pound of syrup, three pounds of foreign wine, however much you have, and combine it. Right away mix it with honey and cook so that it doesn’t boil over. As soon as it’s done, let it settle, and then pour it into vessels.

With time, sbiten became a non-alcoholic drink and gained greatly in popularity. In the summer it was consumed cold, but it was especially popular in the winter, when it was used both to warm up and to treat ailments such as colds.

A man who sold sbiten on the streets, squares and fairs was called a sbitenshchik. These traders carried the drink around in vessels that are considered the prototype of the famous Russian samovar, and served it with pocket-shaped buns, kalachi, that were hung around their waists. Sbiten-hawkers were so ubiquitous in Russian cities and towns in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that their depiction can be found on many engravings, woodblock prints and watercolor paintings from that era.

One of the best known images of this profession (left) can be found in the album, A picturesque representation of the manners, customs, and amusements of the Russians in one hundred colored plates with an accurate explanation of each plate in English and French. The book, published in 1803 in three volumes, was the work of English artist John Augustus Atkinson. Atkinson lived in Russia for 17 years. He arrived in 1784, at the age of 9, with his uncle, James Walker, an engraver to the court of Empress Catherine the Great. He left in 1801, most likely following the death of Catherine’s son, emperor Paul I.

A popular comic opera composed by Yakov Knyazhin in 1783 was called Sbitenshchik. Its plot was a combination of Beaumarchais’s The Barber of Seville and Molière’s The School for Husbands. Figaro’s role was played by sbitenshchik Stepan, who was no less cunning, resourceful, cheerful, and cynical than his European counterpart. Knyazhin’s contemporaries believed the opera was written “in order to please the Russian partier and peanut gallery,” which meant the commoners, and not the aristocracy.

The number of sbiten recipes was probably equal to the number of the drink’s peddlers, because everyone used their own mix of spices and herbs, as well as proprietary proportions. The general recipe, however, was pretty much the same. Honey was dissolved in water, adding sugar or syrup or molasses. The mixture was boiled for some time, then the spices were added. Following that, sbiten was left for a few hours to infuse, then was filtered. If the drink was made with medicinal herbs, such as sage, St. John’s Wort, or mint, the herbal tea was made in one pot and the honey-spice mixture in another, mixing the two together at the end. The traditional spices used in preparation of sbiten included pepper, cloves, ginger, cinnamon, and star anise.

So, rummage through your spice cabinet, choose your favorite honey, and make some sbiten to warm you up on a fall evening. Best of all, this recipe doesn’t require several hours of infusing the liquid with flavors — just 20-25 minutes at the stove.

Pushkin was a devotee of sbiten at the time that tea was just starting to make its rise among the elite. One contemporary recalled how Pushkin summoned a sbitenshchik and all gathered drank sbiten, to which Pushkin joked, “What do we need tea for? This is our national drink.”

Sbiten ✦ Сбитень

2 cups water

¼ cup honey

1 tablespoon of your favorite spices (cloves, cardamom, black pepper and star anise are a great start) and herbs (dried mint and marjoram flowers, for example).

Put water on the stove and heat over a low flame. Add the honey slowly, so that it dissolves.

Boil the honey-water mixture for about 10 minutes, skimming the surface regularly to remove the foam.

Next add the spices and herbs, and boil for another 10 or 15 minutes.

If you want to make this into a “Russian Hot Toddy,” add some dry red wine or a liqueur infusion.

Pour the heated liquid through a fine strainer or cheesecloth to strain out the herbs and spices, then enjoy.

Serves 2.