Home › At the Fountain › Peach Melba Sundae
Peach Melba Sundae
Two of the most prominent eating establishments in New York-namely, Martens' and Rector's serve a delicious dessert that is suitable for serving at a fountain. It can rightly be classed under "Sundaes." On the bills of fare this is called "Peach Melba," and the name is a splendid one. The peaches used are whole, are imported and are known as "Melba" peaches. They are, however, quite expensive, coming in glass bottles three or four to a bottle, costing about 60 cents per bottle. Any good American peach will answer the purpose, however, as it would be exceedingly difficult to get 50 or 60 cents for a sundae, which are the prices charged in these restaurants. Use half a large preserved peach, free from stone. Place in a suitable glass or china dish of the saucer type. This dish should be about 4 inches in diameter and 11½ inches from base to rim. Over the peach place a suit- Use odd moments to keep the silver bright. able quantity of ice cream, either free from flavor or vanilla flavor, and over the ice cream and peach pour from 2 to 3 ounces of rich and strong strawberry syrup This syrup should be at least twice the strength of ordinary syrup utilized in the regular manner. A number of strawberries in their whole form can be added, especially when the fruit is in season. This sundae is delicious and should surely make a hit. You will note that a special dish is described for serving this, as the ordinary sundae container is too small to properly hold the contents as above stated, and the peach being slippery the container should be flat or almost flat at the bottom, and not merely as much rounded as the sundae cup. If you place this on your bill of fare and serve it nicely and with first-class quality of ingredients throughout, it will result in increased business, especially if it is advertised properly; for instance, “PEACH MELBA, THE FIRST TIME AT A SODA FOUNTAIN; DELICIOUS, TRY IT," and similar other ways, too many to relate. This sundae can be made thoroughly high grade of the very best products for not exceeding 5 cents, and should sell for 15 cents. It is only delicious and palatable when made from the best products, first-class ice cream, good peach and fine strawberry syrup, and must be served in a neat manner.
An assembly job rather than a cooked recipe, but the proportions and the dish itself are the whole point. A few of the fountain-trade specifics need translating.
- The dish dimensions"4 inches in diameter and 11½ inches from base to rim" cannot be right; the second figure is almost certainly a misprint, and something on the order of 1½ inches is what is meant. A shallow, flat-bottomed coupe or saucer-style dish is what is wanted, and the reasoning given is sound — a peach half will slide out of a rounded sundae cup.
- Ounces are fluid ouncesThe 2 to 3 ounces of syrup is volume, roughly 1/4 to a generous 1/3 cup, poured over the whole. That is generous by modern habit; it is meant to pool in the saucer.
- "Twice the strength of ordinary syrup"Fountain syrups were made up for soda work at a standard dilution. The instruction here is simply for a syrup at least twice that strength: markedly heavier and more concentrated than the pourable syrup on the counter.
- "Melba" peaches in bottlesThese were imported whole preserved peaches, sold three or four to a glass bottle. Good tinned or jarred peach halves in syrup are the direct equivalent; drain them well or the syrup dilutes on the plate.
- "Ice cream free from flavor"I.e. a plain sweet-cream ice, made without vanilla or extract. Vanilla is offered as the alternative.
- The sauce is the departureEscoffier's version uses raspberry, not strawberry. If you want the dish as it came to be standardised, use a raspberry purée sweetened to taste; the strawberry syrup here is the fountain's substitution.
- YieldHalf a large preserved peach per serving, so a bottle of three or four whole peaches makes six to eight sundaes.
Peach Melba is generally traced to Escoffier, who built a dish of poached peaches and vanilla ice cream in honour of the Australian soprano Nellie Melba during her London seasons in the 1890s; the raspberry purée is often said to have been attached to the dish later. This entry catches the moment it crossed from the dining room to the drugstore counter: the author notes that Martens' and Rector's, two of the grander New York houses, serve it at 50 or 60 cents, and works out that a soda fountain can produce a creditable version for a nickel and sell it for fifteen. The advertising copy he suggests — "THE FIRST TIME AT A SODA FOUNTAIN" — is the real subject of the page. American fountain manuals of this period are as much about menu strategy and margin as about cookery, and the substitution of cheap domestic peaches for imported bottled ones, and strawberry syrup for raspberry purée, is exactly how a restaurant dish became a counter staple.