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Peach Cream
Peach Floss Syrup, 1 ounce; Plain or Whipped Cream, 1 ounce. Serve in a mineral glass, fill with fine and coarse stream, top with grated nutmeg.
A fountain formula rather than a kitchen one: two ounces of liquid, a glass of carbonated water and thirty seconds of work. The whole thing hinges on how the soda water goes in.
- Fine and coarse streamA soda fountain draft arm gave a fine spray and a heavy coarse jet. The wording suggests the fine stream went in first, directed into the syrup and cream to mix and aerate them, with the coarse stream filling the glass, though manuals vary on the order. At home, use a siphon or a bottle of well-chilled seltzer: a short, forceful pour to blend, then a slower fill down the side of the glass.
- Ounces here are fluid ouncesOne ounce of syrup and one of cream, so two tablespoons each. This is a small, restrained drink by modern standards; fountain sodas of the period ran to roughly 8 to 10 ounces total.
- Mineral glassA straight-sided, heavy-bottomed fountain glass, thicker than a soda glass and without a foot; capacity was on the order of a tall tumbler. Any tall tumbler will do. Chill it first.
- Peach floss syrup"Floss" appears to denote a foaming syrup, a fruit syrup cut with a foam base so it built a fluffy head under the carbonated stream. Plain peach syrup will taste right but drink flat; a commercial foaming or "floss" fountain base restores the texture.
- Plain or whipped creamPlain cream means heavy cream poured straight in, which gives a smooth, opaque drink. Whipped cream was spooned in and left to sit on top, so the same formula produced two quite different results. Choose one and commit.
- The nutmegGrate it over the finished glass, not into the mix. Pre-ground nutmeg sinks and tastes dusty; a fresh grating sits on the foam and is most of the aroma the drinker gets.
- Serve at onceCream and carbonation separate within a minute or two, and the head collapses. Build the glass in front of whoever is drinking it. Yield is one glass.
This comes from the golden age of the American soda fountain, when a druggist's dispenser was expected to have a great many such formulas at hand and books like this one existed to supply them. Fountain manuals of the period are written in a compressed trade shorthand "1 ounce, fine and coarse stream, mineral glass" because they were addressed to someone standing at the apparatus, not to a home cook. Cream drinks were a large part of the repertoire, and stood alongside plain flavored sodas and the ice cream sodas and sundaes of the same era. The dusting of grated nutmeg on a cream-and-soda drink echoes far older practice: nutmeg had topped eggnog, syllabub and milk punch for well over a century before it arrived on the marble counter.