The Oakland
Mix two tablespoonfuls of orgeat syrup with two tablespoonfuls of shredded cocoanut. Pour over a dishful of vanilla ice cream and decorate with a blanched almond.
A soda-fountain assembly rather than a cooked dish, so everything depends on the two ingredients you buy and the moment you combine them.
- OrgeatAn almond syrup, sweetened and usually scented with orange-flower water. It is sold today in the cocktail-mixer aisle; buy a commercial bottle rather than improvising, since older home formulas sometimes leaned on bitter almond.
- "Cocoanut"Shredded coconut of the period was often sold unsweetened and dried, and fresh-grated was still common. Modern bagged sweetened flake will push an already sweet sundae over the edge; look for unsweetened shredded or desiccated coconut.
- Mix at the last minuteThe syrup and coconut should be stirred together and spooned over immediately. Left to stand, the coconut drinks the syrup and turns into a pasty clump instead of a loose sauce.
- "A dishful"The recipe gives no measure for the ice cream; the quantities of syrup, coconut and the single almond indicate one serving.
- Blanched almondBlanched means skinned, not toasted: cover raw almonds with boiling water for a minute and slip the skins off. A single whole almond set on top is the whole decoration.
- If you want more from itToasting the coconut in a dry pan until just golden, and cooling it before mixing, gives the dish a flavour it otherwise lacks. That is a departure from the original, which relies entirely on the perfume of the orgeat.
Named sundaes like this one were the stock in trade of the American soda fountain, where a house dish was often christened after a hotel, a city or a local landmark and then copied elsewhere. Collections of non-alcoholic drinks and fountain dishes were widely published in the early twentieth century, and orgeat was among the syrups a fountain might carry. The name of the syrup goes back through French orge to the Latin for barley, hordeum — early orgeat was a barley drink, and the almond version displaced it while keeping the old name.<br><br>The recipe's real interest is how little it asks: no cooking, no churning, just a bought syrup, a bought coconut and one almond, which is exactly how a fountain man built a dozen distinct items from the same dozen jars.