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You are welcome, my fair guests; that noble lady,
Or gentleman, that is not freely merry,
Is not my friend: This to confirm my welcome:
And to you all good health. ——- Shakespeare (Henry VIII)
Here’s to all, one more toast and please pardon me if I leave you to pick the bill!!! My bit is over after making the toast. It takes considerable effrontery to make a great toast. Coupled with the practice of holding the glass at the right height and angle and an acute awareness of the occasion (by the time of the toast you may already be a few drinks down!!), there is also the business of at least recognizing the faces of those who you are toasting. Further, you must be endowed with great oratory and voice modulation skills.
As early as the 6th Century B.C., the Greeks were toasting to the health of their friend’s for a highly practical reason — to assure them that the wine they were about to drink wasn’t poisoned. To spike the wine with poison had become an all too common means of dealing with social problems — disposing of an enemy, silencing the competition, preventing a messy divorce, and the like. It became a symbol of friendship for the host to pour wine from a common pitcher, drink it before his guests, and satisfied that it was a good experience; raise his glass to his friends to do likewise.

The term toast comes from the Roman practice of dropping a piece of burnt bread into the wine. This was done to temper some of the bad wines the Romans sometimes had to drink. Even Falstaff said, “put toast in’t” when he was requesting a jug of wine in Shakespeare’s Merry Wives of Windsor. In the 1700′s, party-goers even liked to toast to the health of people not present — especially beautiful women. Very similar to what an award winner does when they get a mike, “…and I would like to thank my eighteen horses and twenty hens, my Godmother’s gardener and his scrawny cat called Toaster, not to forget the policeman who gave me my first parking ticket and the good officer who booked me for exceeding the alcohol limit or was that for speeding…”

Coming to the ritual of clinking glasses; there are so many theories behind this custom yet no real proof. Eons ago in Greece a toast was seen as a gesture of good faith. The clinking of glasses at this time may have been a sneaky way for wine to be passed back and forth to prove its safety. Many cultures believed that clinking glasses drove away evil spirits. Blame the evil spirits if you got drunk!!! That’s easy, and a great excuse. The sound of the clinks was considered welcoming at weddings and birthdays. The Italian toast “cin cin” sounds like the glasses touching each other .
Up until the 16th century, toasts were usually only made to “good health”. Today it is to salute a special day, marriage, promotion at work, a divorce (which many consider a happy occasion) and other special occasions. Etiquette says you have to clink glasses with all present at your table. Well over a crowded 20-seater it seems a tad difficult unless you crawl on all fours on the table-top and clink with each person one by one. Women should take the precaution of not wearing a skirt. So let us just stick to those within clinking distance and make an eye contact with the rest.
However the idea behind clinking glasses that I find closest to a rationale has to do with the five senses. Savouring your drink is a most sensuous activity. We see the colour of the liquid, our tongue touches and tastes , we smell the bouquet (aroma of the wine) but what do we hear other than a buzz in our head or a thump when we fall off our chairs, hence the clink of glasses to clinch the five senses together. We hear the lilt of the clink; kind of a get ready sound like the gun shot signifying the beginning of a race or a gun salute at a state funeral. Make sure you are holding the glass right when you clink. The long stemmed glasses need to be held at the base and the rims need to touch delicately to get the perfect sound. The sound also depends on how full or empty your glass is. Ask the Jal-Tarang exponent, he will guide you in the art of getting the best sound out of your glass. Just take care you don’t empty your glass too frequently to get the right quantity. Well if you do no sweat, you can always get a refill. Practice makes perfect they say.
This brings me back to the art of making a toast. It’s similar to being asked to kiss the Queen, considered a great honor (don’t ask by who), but nobody wants to do it! Maybe it is the fear of having to face a large crowd. There’s pressure to do it right and not mess up, but it’s not as hard as it looks. A great toast requires a little creativity, a little patience, some hard work, ingenuity and many glasses of good wine.

Here’s a spirit raiser which has helped me on many an occasion. I call it “War and Peach”. You do not need a stellar wine, a reasonably tolerable one will do (but no table wine please). The white version tastes better than the red one. So after you have procured the bottle uncork and pour it into a bowl and let it breathe a while. In this add approximately a quarter of the wine bottle of Peach Schnapps and an equal quantity of Grand Marnier or Cointreau or Southern Comfort Peach Liqueur. A half liter bottle of chilled lemonade and small pieces of crispy Granny Smith apples go in next. The best way is to dunk your glass in the bowl and drink and not SIP before you make the toast. You shall find peach!!

I end by (mis)quoting the bard once again…

“We eat, we drink and in communion sweet
Quaff immortality and joy.”

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