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Lemon-Orangeade
Use as many oranges as lemons and carbonated, instead of "plain," water. Mix the juice with amount of sugar required some hours before serving, at the last moment, only, adding the carbonated water. Pineapple juice may be substituted for the orange, and as an artistic finish, a graceful touch is the addition of shredded orange, pineapple, cherries, berries, or angelica..
A variation entry that assumes you have already read the plain lemonade recipe preceding it, so the base proportions are left unstated. The one instruction that matters is the last: the carbonated water goes in at the moment of serving, not before.
- The missing base proportionsThe original gives no quantities because it builds on a standard lemonade. A workable base is the juice of 3 lemons and 3 oranges, 3/4 cup sugar, and about 3 cups of carbonated water. Taste the sweetened juice before diluting; oranges vary enough in sugar that a fixed ratio is unreliable.
- Dissolve the sugar first"Some hours before serving" is probably doing real work here. Granulated sugar dissolves slowly in cold liquid, and the resting time helps prevent a gritty layer at the bottom of the pitcher. A simple syrup, made ahead and chilled, does the same job faster.
- Carbonated water at the last momentAdded early, the bubbles are gone by the time the glasses reach the table. Chill both the juice base and the water thoroughly first, since carbonation holds far better in cold liquid, and pour the water down the side of the pitcher rather than into the middle.
- "Plain" waterThe quotation marks mark it as the ordinary still water of the base recipe. Period cookbooks also called carbonated water aerated, seltzer or soda water; any unflavoured, unsweetened sparkling water works, though a low-mineral one interferes least with the fruit.
- Pineapple juicePackaged pineapple juice was not widely available when this was written, so fresh-pressed juice is the likely intention; it is generally thinner and sharper than modern canned or bottled juice. If using packaged juice, consider cutting the added sugar back, and strain it so the drink stays clear.
- AngelicaCandied angelica stem, bright green and faintly resinous, was a standard confectioner's garnish and is now sold mainly through baking suppliers. Candied citrus peel or a strip of cucumber stands in for the colour if you cannot find it.
- The garnishShredded orange means fine strips of flesh or zest rather than juice. Cut the fruit and berries just before serving; they bleed and soften quickly in an acidic, sugary liquid.
- YieldThe proportions above fill about six tumblers. The instruction to add the water at the last moment suggests a batch mixed in a pitcher rather than glasses built to order.
Lemonade made with carbonated rather than still water belongs to the era when bottled aerated waters moved out of the pharmacy and into the household. Artificial carbonation was commercialised in the late eighteenth century, but it was the drugstore soda fountain of the later nineteenth century that taught American drinkers to expect fizz in a fruit drink, and domestic cookbooks followed. Fruit-cookery books are often said to have proliferated around the turn of the twentieth century, as California and Florida citrus reached eastern markets in quantity by rail and oranges are traditionally described as shifting from a Christmas luxury to an everyday ingredient. The closing line about "an artistic finish" is characteristic of the period's domestic-science writing, which treated the appearance of a dish as a skill to be taught alongside its making.