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It’s been one of her favourite traditions for decades but it looks as if Queen Elizabeth has to give up her daily tipple on medical advice.
Royal doctors have apparently advised the 95-year-old British monarch to quit drinking – except on special occasions – so that she can be in the best possible physical shape for her Platinum Jubilee celebrations next year.
Sources emphasise that the queen, who was seen using a walking stick in Wales recently “for comfort” rather than because of a medical issue, is in good health. They say cutting back on the booze is more a precautionary measure as she has a busy few months ahead.
“The queen has been told to give up her evening drink which is usually a martini,” a family friend told UK royal expert Katie Nicholl.
The queen, like her eldest son, Prince Charles, is a fan of a martini and she’s also said to be partial to her late mother’s favourite toot: Dubonnet (a wine-based aperitif) and gin.
She doesn’t seem to be a big wine drinker, backed by a comment she made during a visit to the National Institute of Agricultural Botany (NIAB) in 2019.
While discussing the growing popularity of English wine with NIAB’s chief executive Tina Barsby, Her Majesty divulged she has “some vines” in Windsor, before adding, “I don’t actually drink wine myself, but I hear it’s very good.”
The Queen Mother, who died in 2002 aged 101, was certainly not shy to knock back a drink or two.
Adrian Tinniswood’s Behind the Throne: A Domestic History of the Royal Household, cites Margaret Rhodes – the niece and one-time lady of the bedchamber to the Queen Mother – as saying the royal would have a gin and Dubonnet before lunch, wine with the meal, a martini before dinner then a glass of champagne.
The royal family have branched out into making gin. Hillsborough Castle and Gardens, the queen’s Northern Ireland residence, makes its own variety of gin, using rose petals, apples and pears from the gardens.
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Last July saw Buckingham Palace launching its own official gin, which sold out online in eight hours. In November they launched another one made with plants grown at the queen’s Sandringham estate.
Sources: dailymail.co.uk, harpersbazaar.com
