Last summer I was looking for a way to drink spiced wine which was appropriate to the weather, and came across AnachronistsCookbook 's recipe for what they termed "Nero's Smoothie."

I made their recipe, but in the process found a number of problems (and solutions) and so I present my version of their version of Apicius's drink.

My techniques for the roasting and crushing of the date stones were helped by this open-access paper on roasting date stones for beverage use.

Supplies

Bottle of white wine (cheapest)

250 grams of honey (9 oz)

2 teaspoons of ground allspice

8 strands of saffron

1 bayleaf

1/2 teaspoon of crushed roasted date stones (OR 1/2 teaspoon of ground coffee)

Coffee filter paper and holder

Small funnel

Step 1: Washing the Date Stones

Finding dates: easy.

Finding dates with stones in them: hard. At least in New Zealand.

I eventually found a pack of organic, blah blah dates which still had the stones in them. This small bag cost me ten dollars and had the grand total of ten dates in it. That works out at one dollar per date stone, which still rankles.

Slice each date and pull out the stone.

Scrape the worst of the remaining flesh from the stone.

Once all the stones are scraped clean-ish, put them, plus half a cup of the wine into a small pot with a close-fitting lid and simmer gently for an hour.

Drain the pan, discarding the wine, and the stones should like they do in the last photograph above.

Step 2: Drying, Roasting and Crushing the Date Stones

AnachronistsCookbook didn't give precise details of their date-stone roasting, but the published research did.

In the research, the date stones were first dried at 24C (75F) for one day. I elected to go for a Roman-appropriate sun-dried method.

The stones were put on a metal sheet which was laid in full sun, with a glass cover to concentrate the heat and keep insects away. The glass cover was elevated on chopsticks to allow airflow underneath.

After an afternoon in the sun, the date stones felt completely dry to the touch.

The research seems to have suggested an "ideal" roasting time of 20 minutes at 180 degrees centigrade (356 Fahrenheit).

The stones were brought out of the oven promptly and allowed to cool naturally.

After cooling, they were put through a coffee grinder, to make ground roasted date stones.

PLEASE NOTE. After all this, the result was pretty indistinguishable from ground coffee, so I would honestly suggest that you save yourself a lot of time, trouble and expense and just use that instead.

Step 3: Making the Flavour Syrup

Measure out the honey and spices, and put them into a small pot with a tight-fitting lid.

Add a quarter of a cup of the wine and the bay leaf.

I added two leaves because 1) they were small and 2) I have a big tree full of them. These were fresh bay leaves, but I'm sure that dried would work just as well.

Carefully heat for an hour. This doesn't need to boil, and if it does then it will stick to the pan and burn and caramelise and do all sorts of things. The mixture just needs to be warm, not bubbling.

After an hour, pour the liquid through a filter paper. (This took about half an hour, so don't worry)

NOTE:- the original 'Ible performed multiple filters, and the two thousand year-old recipe had all sorts of stuff involved. It must be understood that what we call "honey" and "wine" and "spices" are much, much purer than even the finest available to a Roman. This really only needs one pass through a coffee filter.

NOTE 2:- since this is mostly honey, it will take a while to pass through the filter and it will get thicker as it cools. I set the filter up inside the oven set to 80 C (150F) which kept things warm enough that the filter ran cleanly.

At the end of this, you'll have about 2/3 of a cup of dark brown liquid.

Warm the rest of the wine to just above room temperature, add the infused honey and then decant back into the bottle.

Step 4: Serving and Suggestions

The original Roman recipe required sending a slave to run up a mountain and bring back some snow.

Should there be no snow-covered mountains near you, then putting the bottle into the fridge for a couple of hours should work just as well.

Since "only drunkards and barbarians take their wine un-watered" the spiced wine should be served diluted with an equal volume of water. Sparkling water works extremely well.

It took me so long to make this, that I was thoroughly "scunnered" by the time it was finished. I served it to friends at a board-game session in order to be rid of it, and instantly regretted that decision. The drink is absolutely wonderful. The acidity of the cheap white wine is covered by the sweetness of the honey and the spices, and the overwhelming sweetness of that much honey is ameliorated by the watering-down process. Every sip of this brings a different facet of the flavourings and it was universally admired and enjoyed.

I would only say that the roast date stones, while authentic, are really not needed and can be replaced by an equivalent quantity of ground coffee beans, at much lower cost and effort.