goes a-Wassailing
n the first Thursday after Thanksgiving, Bob Moses places a cardboard crown on his head, draws the blinds closed to his shop, and mixes what he hopes will be this year’s award-winning Wassail recipe. Exactly what goes into his mixture of mulled spices and fruit juices is a secret. He starts the night before, slowly simmering his ingredients at home before loading his concoction into portable containers for delivery to his ice cream shop for the tasting—a trick he feels is essential to winning Denton’s annual Wassail Fest.

Not that he’s won lately. Last year, Valerie Clegg, who has a tearoom near Bob’s, walked home with the prize. She started two days ahead, using a recipe provided by a customer, and served 1,200 cups of Wassail. Bob’s 16 gallons of Wassail ran out early because it was so popular. Yet he still couldn’t beat Valerie. “I’ve managed to win twice, but I’ve tried the last four or five years without success,” he says. “I can’t seem to get back in there.”

In Denton, they get serious about Wassail Fest, one of the highlights of the annual Holiday Lighting Festival. Carolers sing popular Christmas songs from all corners of the city’s famous Square, the smell of long-simmered Wassail wafts through the air, Santa saunters through, and the holiday spirit makes people forget their troubles and rejoice with neighbors in ringing in the Christmas season. “Everybody I’ve met in the last 20 years in Denton I usually see at the festival,” says Julie Glover, a member of the Denton Holiday Lighting Festival Association, which began hosting a pre-Christmas bash for the city in 1988. “It truly is a real Norman Rockwell moment.”

The Denton Main Street Association started the Wassail tradition a decade ago in 1998 as part of the Holiday Lighting Festival. Last year, nearly 10,000 people poured out for the Wassail-tasting, carol singing and tree-lighting ceremony. “I enjoy walking around the Square and seeing families together and seeing the reactions of the little kids—all the way from watching them eat something with their hands and getting their faces all messy to dancing and doing their little waddles to the music,” says Bob, who got involved a decade ago at the very beginning of the Wassail Fest. That’s also the year he won his first Wassail crown.

Denton’s Wassail Fest is a chili cook-off-type event where local merchants compete for the title of Wassail Fest king or queen by creating the most popular version of the typically Germanic holiday drink. Traditionally made from mulled spices such as cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg, the ingredients are combined with a variety of fruit juices and simmered until hot. Residents wander from shop to shop on the Square, tasting and voting for the winner, who gets nothing more than a costume shop crown and bragging rights.

Competition can be fierce. If you happen to pass the shops along the Square the night of Holiday Lighting, you might hear some friendly neighborly heckling. Some shop owners take ballots and fill in their name ahead of time in the hope that customers will vote for their store. “This is one case where early voting usually does work,” Glover laughs. Traci Davis, who organizes the Wassail Fest, says the competitors are very, well, competitive. “I had to count up all the ballots and they were calling me up to see who won, ‘How many votes do we have?’” she says. One year a certain team (our lips are sealed) tried to rig the proceedings by putting alcohol in the Wassail. They didn’t win.

Even though Bob hasn’t won the crown recently, he insists upon wearing the crown his co-workers made for him the first year he won. Made of nothing fancier than cardboard, the crown seems more fitting for a 9-year-old than a man of Bob’s age, but he believes in tradition. Because people expect it, he wears the crown every year without fail. The crown itself isn’t important. It’s the tradition of everyone—families, students, children and friends—all coming together to celebrate the season.

Though it’s only one night a year, the Holiday Lighting Festival and Wassail Fest is a reminder that Denton’s historic Square remains the city’s living room, a place where people can gather to shop, eat and party. The highlight of the evening is the annual Christmas tree lighting and visit by Santa, but all evening long, children can visit a variety of arts and crafts booths along the Square. Girl Scout troops often sponsor cookie icing booths; churches pitch in with booths where children can create their own Christmas ornaments. Face painting, carriage rides and pictures with Santa are also available for a cost of $5 or less. WFAA sponsors a Santa’s Helpers Toy Drive for donations of new unwrapped toys to be distributed to needy families living in Denton County.

And yes, Denton has the real Santa. When he emerges, 3-year-olds fling themselves at his legs like teenage girls at a Jonas Brothers’ concert, hoping for the chance to meet their biggest celebrity. The last few years a police escort has helped Santa (who has a real beard) enter and leave the Square safely. “If you’re 3, he is a rock star,” says Glover.

Toward the end of the evening, the scene changes and the sounds of the Grammy award-winning band Brave Combo fill the downtown Square. Brave Combo won a Grammy in 1999 in the best polka category for the album “Polkasonic,” and again in 2005 for its album “Let’s Kiss.” For the Holiday Lighting festival, its repertoire focuses on family-friendly Christmas songs, such as “The Little Drummer Boy” or “It’s Christmas, Man!,” but it has become a tradition to get college students and local residents who might not normally intermingle involved in the group’s annual rendition of “The Chicken Dance.”

“I have a wonderful memory a few years ago of being in a circle for the chicken dance with the mayor, the mayor pro tem and two city council members and a bunch of college kids with green hair,” says Glover. She chuckles. “It was really funny.”

Brave Combo draws a different crowd to the Holiday Lighting Festival, arguably a college crowd, but make no mistake, parents won’t have to cover their children’s ears at any point during the performance. “Everyone likes Brave Combo because they’re not too crazy, but they’re crazy enough that you will have a good time,” says Micah Pazoureck, a member of the Denton Holiday Lighting Festival Association.

With so much focus on Denton as an environmentally friendly community, the Holiday Lighting Festival Association hopes to change all the lights downtown to LED, making them more energy efficient and cost effective in the long run. (Visitors might not realize that Denton’s Square is lit up year round with tiny white Christmas lights, but the big Christmas tree gets colored lights. Proceeds from the Holiday Lighting Festival pay for the Square’s year-round display.) Last year, the city provided Wassail Fest competitors with recyclable cups in an attempt to cut down on waste. Some merchants go through upwards of 900 cups during the night. “We’re trying to make the festival more earth friendly,” says Micah.

The Bayless-Selby House Museum in Denton’s Historical Park, just west of the Square, offers a Victorian-style musical evening for visitors during the festival as well as other events during the holiday season. The museum opens up on the two Thursday evenings after the festival for the Holiday Musicale, presenting musicians with help from the Greater Denton Arts Council (GDAC), The Arts Guild of Denton, Texas Commission on the Arts and National Endowment for the Arts. The musicales feature 19th century Christmas carols and visitors sing along as they enjoy the ambience of the Victorian-era décor. “We have made song books for our sing-along visitors,” says museum manager Robyn Lee. “But some bring their own.”

When Denton resident Caroline Booth Lara brought her son to the festival last year, she watched his eyes widen as the tall fir Christmas tree was illuminated, lighting up the downtown Square to thunderous applause. The festival gives children a traditional Christmas experience while allowing older souls the opportunity to re-live their holiday memories, whether it is hearing the carolers on the Square or simply conversing with old friends over a cup of Wassail.

“I tear up two or three times during the night,” says Julie Glover, her face markedly serious. “You see some little kid seeing Santa, or the tree comes on when it is supposed to. You see all those people singing, it is just a cool thing,” she pauses. “Of course, I cry at coffee commercials too.”

 by laura matysiak