Ulysses S. Grant was rarely sober, and was key to the defeat of the Confederacy. And no one provides a better example of this than Winston Churchill. Throughout his career, Churchill managed a daring escape from a Boer prison camp, wrote 72 volumes , led as Prime Minister of Britain for nine years, and oh yeah, he defeated Hitler albeit, with a little help. And he did all of it while drinking. His uncompromising bravery, brilliance, and impressive BAC make him my ultimate drunk role model.
Churchill was very particular about what he drank, and every occasion had a precise alcohol accompaniment. This is self care I can get behind. His favorite was Pol Roger.
To make it palatable, we had to add whisky. By diligent effort, I learnt to like it. Contrary to popular belief, he liked it quite weak and was known to get upset if someone made it too strong. Churchill rarely went without an after-dinner brandy. While we wouldn't suggest consuming the goodies listed in this article in one go, we reckon dabbling in the odd one or two should be fine. It's also an apt, biannual way of marking the life of this great man — a dabble for his birthday on 30 November and again on 24 January, the date he died.
One non -boozy liquid that Winston adored was soup. Thin, non-creamy soups were what Churchill hankered after — and that applied to his turtle soup too. This, he once served up to President Roosevelt, after a Commander Thompson spotted a couple of tins in a Piccadilly grocers, and took the rare commodity back to Number Turtle soup is even rarer in London these days extinct, even , although the Museum of Brands in Notting Hill still has one in stock.
The corpulent PM would regularly round off dinner with a cheese platter. So when you go in, what should you order — a ballsy cheddar? A patriotic Red Leicester? Apparently not. Churchill also adored his Indian curries so there are plenty of places to commemorate him all across the capital. However, he wasn't keen on Chinese sorry, Chinatown , or sauerkraut apologies Herman ze German.
Dessert was never at the top of Churchill's gourmet agenda, but there was a notable exception in his 79th birthday cake , served up in the Cabinet Room.
This was covered in edible sugar book spines, representing the many tomes he'd written when not busy with war duties. If you don't quite have those credentials, try baking a cake in the form of some of the recent books you've read.
It's almost as good. History is giddy with anecdotes of Churchill's drinking. You may think a man who started the day with a whisky or brandy must have been a raging lush — but Churchill's morning tipple was heavily diluted you should still only attempt this if you're off work for the day , and many historians say he was rarely actually blotto.
That's not to say he didn't get through gallons of booze. According to historian Sir David Cannadine, Conservative politician and Chancellor of the Exchequer Rab Butler had no fewer than eight huge meals foisted on him at Downing Street during , all washed down with libations of brandy. So much brandy, that Butler was forced to pour some of it down the sides of his shoes.
Whether the dinner guest had to squelch his way out of Number 10, is not recorded. Champagne was Churchill's greatest weakness, or strength, as he liked to put it. As with cream soups, Churchill felt distinctly antagonistic toward anything vaguely resembling a cocktail. So he almost certainly wouldn't have been caught partaking in one of London's cocktail masterclasses. It's strange then, that to mark Churchill's 90th birthday, Joe Gilmore — one of the longest serving barmen at The Savoy's American Bar — invented the Blenheim cocktail.
It's a rather sickly sounding tincture combining brandy, Lillet Blanc and orange juice, and although it no longer sits on the American Bar menu, there's nothing to stop you asking the bartenders if they'd consider a recreation. Winston fell in love with Havana cigars when he was a journalist in Cuba. Nowadays, that shop is James J Fox — and that very same order can still be seen written in a big ledger, recently perused by Churchill's great grandson Jonathan Sandys photo below.
Incidentally, as Nic Wing — former cigar journalist — wrote: "This first delivery of cigars was made to the bachelor flat which he stayed in on his return from Cuba. It is above what, ironically enough, is now a cigar store; Sautter, in Mount Street, Mayfair. So take your pick of Cubans from either Sautter or JJ Fox, then go and puff it on the cigar terrace of the Churchill Hotel, Marble Arch, where you'll be accompanied by a statue of a young Winston. Nic reckoned that Churchill smoked in the region of , cigars in his lifetime.
Although to be fair, he likely chewed his way through half of them.
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