Myths about milk wine

The myth comes from the milky colour of fresh toddy, the fermented palm sap sold in taverns, which is sometimes called palm wine. In fact toddy is never an ingredient. Milk wine is made from arrack, which is distilled from toddy, or from brandy.

The difference is huge in practice. Toddy is cloudy, fizzy and roughly the strength of beer, and it turns sour within a day. Milk wine is clear, still, sweet and keeps for months. They are unrelated drinks that share only a loose link through the coconut palm.

Toddy is worth tasting on its own terms on any trip to the west coast or the north. Just do not expect it to be milk wine.

Milk wine tastes sweet, smooth and gentle, which leads people to assume it is low in alcohol. It is usually roughly 15 to 20 per cent, about the strength of port or sherry, and around half the strength of the arrack that went into it.

Sweetness and the softening effect of the milk hide the strength. That is why milk wine is served in tiny glasses, and why guests visiting several homes on Christmas Day can be surprised by how they feel by evening.

Treat it like any liqueur: a small glass at a time, with food and water, and none at all before driving.

Visitors who hear about a Christmas drink with milk and spirit often picture an Irish cream liqueur or eggnog. Milk wine is the opposite. The milk is curdled on purpose and strained out, leaving a clear, golden drink that pours like a light liqueur.

Milk wine does have a silky feel, because clarification removes harsh notes from the spirit. That texture is smooth rather than creamy. A milk wine that looks milky has not been strained properly.

Some milk components do remain, so milk wine is still unsuitable for anyone with a milk allergy.

Milk wine is closely associated with Sri Lanka's Burghers, many of whom descend from Dutch and Portuguese settlers, so it is often described as a Dutch drink. The method, though, is English clarified milk punch, recorded in British households from the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.

The likeliest story is a blend. The technique arrived through British colonial households, was taken up by Burgher and other Christian families who already had strong Christmas baking traditions, and was adapted with arrack and local spices. No single community invented it alone.

Exact dates are uncertain, because the recipe lived in family notebooks. What is certain is that milk wine is now a Sri Lankan tradition in its own right.

Myth five says milk wine contains wine. It does not. Wine in Sri Lankan household English means a sweet home-made festive drink, as in ginger wine. The alcohol in milk wine comes from arrack or brandy.

Myth six says milk wine spoils in days. A properly strained bottle keeps for months, because the curds are gone and the alcohol and sugar preserve it. Myth seven says it must be drunk cold; it is traditionally served at room temperature. Myth eight says any illicit spirit will do. Families use licensed arrack or brandy, and illicit kasippu, which can be dangerous, has no place in it.

One half-truth is worth keeping: milk wine is better after a few weeks. Most families agree it smooths out with rest, which is why they start in November.

Milk wine is a home-made Christmas liqueur of Sri Lanka's Burgher and wider Christian families, made from arrack or brandy, milk, sugar, citrus and spice, curdled and strained until clear, bottled and rested for weeks. It is served in small glasses with Christmas cake, love cake or breudher.

Lankan Stays & Trails can help December travellers find the real thing at Christmas fairs and from home bakers in Colombo and Negombo, which is the best way to leave the myths behind.