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Garland Punch
Mix one half pint of pineapple juice, one half pint grape juice, and one pint of ginger ale. Sweeten with one half pint of plain syrup. Add one quart of water and pour over cracked ice in a punch bowl.
A straightforward temperance punch that needs only unit conversion and a note on sweetness, since commercial juices and sodas are far sweeter now than in 1914.
- The measuresA pint is 2 cups, a half pint 1 cup, a quart 4 cups. So: 1 cup pineapple juice, 1 cup grape juice, 2 cups ginger ale, 1 cup syrup, 4 cups water.
- Plain syrupA sugar syrup, heated until clear and cooled; period sources use anything from equal parts sugar and water to richer proportions. A cup of it is generous against modern sweetened juices; add half, taste, then add the rest.
- Grape juiceIn this period grape juice meant unfermented Concord juice, sold bottled and pasteurized as a temperance drink. Concord is still the right choice; it gives the colour the punch depends on.
- Ginger aleEarly twentieth-century ginger ale was made in a dry, less sweet style as well as sweeter ones. A dry style keeps the punch from turning syrupy.
- Order of assemblyThe recipe pours the whole mixture over cracked ice at once. If you want more fizz, combine juices, syrup and water first, chill them thoroughly, and add the ginger ale when the bowl goes to the table.
- The iceCracked ice melts fast and dilutes a punch already carrying a quart of water. A single large block or a frozen ring melts slowly and holds the balance.
- YieldAbout 2¼ quarts, or roughly 12 to 18 punch cups depending on their size — enough for a modest gathering, and easily doubled.
On Uncle Sam's Water Wagon belongs to the flood of non-alcoholic drink books that appeared in the years just before and during national Prohibition, when hostesses who had given up wine cups still needed something to fill a punch bowl. Bottled fruit juice made that possible: pasteurized Concord grape juice had been marketed since the late nineteenth century expressly as a temperance beverage, and commercial ginger ale gave the fizz and bite that champagne once supplied. Punches of this kind were built on a fixed formula — fruit juice, syrup, water, and a carbonated topper — and then named after a person, a club, or an occasion, which is very likely all that "Garland" signifies here. The result tells you what a dry party looked like in practice: sweet, cold, pale purple, and served by the cupful from a bowl of ice.