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Lemon Syrup (Simple Syrup gallon American)
Simple Syrup, 1 gallon; American Sicilian Lemon Extract, 1 ounce; American Fruit Acid, 2 ounces; American Soda Foam, ½ ounce. The Sicilian Extract is entirely soluble in syrup in any proportions, possesses a fine flavor, and has good keeping qualities. We strongly recommend it and advise its use. The formula may be varied by the use of more extract, if a more pronounced flavor is desired.
This is a trade formula for bulk soda-fountain syrup, written for a dispenser who bought flavoring compounds from a supply house. Two of the four ingredients are proprietary products, and the whole thing has to be translated before it means anything in a home kitchen.
- Simple syrup, fountain strengthSoda-fountain simple syrup of this era was heavy, often in the region of 2 parts sugar to 1 part water by weight, near saturation, so it would hold up to dilution with carbonated water; proportions varied between supply houses. A gallon is 128 fluid ounces; the flavoring additions here amount to 3½ ounces in all, so the syrup is doing nearly all the work.
- American Sicilian Lemon ExtractA house-brand alcoholic solution of cold-pressed lemon peel oil, not lemon juice. The nearest modern equivalent is a good lemon extract or a few drops of lemon essential oil cut with neutral alcohol. Strengths varied between suppliers, so add it to taste rather than trusting the 1 ounce figure.
- American Fruit AcidA solution of citric acid, sometimes blended with tartaric, sold ready-diluted. Concentration was never standardized and this book does not state it, so 2 ounces cannot be converted honestly. Work up from a small quantity of citric acid dissolved in water until the syrup tastes tart enough against soda water.
- American Soda FoamA saponin extract, usually from quillaia (soapbark) or yucca, added purely to make the drink head up in the glass. It contributes nothing to flavor. Quillaia extract is still permitted as a food foaming agent at low levels; if you cannot get it, leave it out and the syrup is unaffected apart from appearance.
- Dilution at the point of serviceThe book gives no serving proportion. Fountain practice of the period generally ran about 1 to 1½ fluid ounces of syrup to a 6 to 8 ounce glass of carbonated water, which would make roughly 85 to 128 drinks from a gallon.
- KeepingThe "good keeping qualities" refer to the flavor not fading, not to sterility. A syrup this sugar-heavy and acidic resists spoilage, but a home batch should be kept covered and refrigerated and watched for surface mold; scale the formula down to a quart unless you are running a counter.
Soda fountain work in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries ran on formula books like this one, published by supply houses whose real business was selling the branded extracts, acids and foams the formulas called for. Every ingredient here except the sugar syrup carries the word "American" because it is a catalog listing as much as a recipe. "Sicilian" lemon was a recognized quality grade as well as a selling line: Sicily dominated the world trade in lemon oil and in citric acid, which was extracted commercially from Italian lemon juice until fermentation processes using molds displaced it in the 1920s. Foaming agents were part of the fountain aesthetic, a drink was expected to arrive with a head, and saponin from soapbark gave it cheaply. The note that a dispenser might use more extract "if a more pronounced flavor is desired" is a reminder that fountain syrups were tuned to local taste and to how heavily a given counter charged its water.