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Fruit Punch
4 cups of sugar. INGREDIENTS. 3 cups of boiling water.
1 cup of tea, freshly made. 5 lemons. 6 oranges.
1 pint of strawberry or grape juice. 1/2 a pint of maraschino cherries.
I bottle of Apollinaris water. 6 quarts of water.
Method.-Grate the pineapple, add the boiling water and the sugar, and boil fifteen minutes; add the tea and strain into the punch-bowl. When cold add the fruit juice, the cherries and the cold water. A short time before serving, add a piece of ice, and, on serving, the Apollinaris water.
Strawberries, mint leaves, or slices of banana may be used in the place of the cherries.
Punch à la Nantes.
INGREDIENTS. 2 pounds of rhubarb.
1 cup of sugar.
1 pint of water.
1 cup of orange juice..
I bay leaf. ¼ a cup of lemon juice. ¼ a cup of ginger syrup.
A large-format party punch, printed with a garbled ingredient list — the pineapple and the sugar appear in the method but never in the list. Read the method first and work backwards.
- The missing ingredientsThe method calls for a grated pineapple and sugar that the list omits. Neither quantity is given; roughly one medium pineapple, grated or crushed with its juice, and about a cup of sugar would suit the volume, but taste the syrup before you commit.
- Apollinaris waterA German sparkling mineral water, widely sold in bottles at the turn of the century and still available. Any dry sparkling mineral water works. It goes in at the moment of serving so the bubbles survive.
- The syrup boilFifteen minutes of boiling extracts the pineapple flavour and concentrates the sweetened liquid before it meets six quarts of dilution.
- The tea"1 cup of tea, freshly made" means brewed tea, not leaves. Brew it strong but stop short of bitterness; the method adds it after the boiling is done.
- Maraschino cherriesThe genuine article was marasca cherries preserved in maraschino liqueur, closer to a cocktail cherry than the bright red confection sold now, though imitations were already circulating by this date. Luxardo-style cherries in syrup are the nearest thing; the syrup can go in too.
- "A piece of ice"A single large block, which chills without watering the punch down. A frozen ring or a few large cubes serve the same purpose. Loose small ice will dilute six quarts noticeably within the hour.
- YieldRoughly seven to eight quarts finished, enough for several dozen punch-cups. It is a reception recipe, not a pitcher for four.
- The second recipePunch à la Nantes is cut off mid-page: ingredients only, no method. Rhubarb stalks (never the leaves), sugar, water and a bay leaf would be simmered and strained, with the citrus and ginger syrup added cold — but treat it as a fragment rather than a working recipe.
Punch reached English kitchens through the East India trade, and the word is generally traced to Hindi pānch, five, for the five components of the original: spirit, sugar, lemon, water and spice. By the time this book appeared, the American version had shed the spirit and kept the architecture — an acid, a sweet syrup, a bulk liquid and something aromatic, here supplied by tea rather than spice. Bottled mineral waters like Apollinaris were a mark of hospitality in the period, imported and advertised heavily, and adding them at the last moment was often said to make a punch that had been sitting on ice taste freshly made.