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Pepsin Phosphate
Shaven ice, ½ tumblerful; lime syrup, 1 ounce; liquid pepsin, 3 dashes; curacoa cordial, 2 dashes; plain soda, 6 ounces. Stir, strain and serve in a mineral tumbler.
A drugstore fountain drink built for the dyspeptic customer, mixed in seconds and served over ice. Nothing here is difficult; the obstacles are the vessels and one ingredient that has left the grocery shelf.
- The tumblersFountain tumblers of the period commonly ran somewhere in the range of 8 to 12 ounces, so half a tumblerful of shaven ice is very roughly 4 to 6 ounces by volume — something like half to three-quarters of a cup of crushed ice. The "mineral tumbler" it is served in appears to be a plain straight-sided glass of similar size, kept for mineral-water drinks.
- Shaven iceShaved, not cubed. It chills and dilutes fast, which is the point in a drink meant to be stirred, strained and drunk immediately. A few seconds in a blender or a canvas Lewis bag with a mallet gets you there.
- Liquid pepsinThis is essence of pepsin, a sweetened glycerin-and-alcohol solution of the hog-stomach enzyme, widely sold in pharmacies of the era as a digestive. It is no longer stocked as a fountain ingredient. Pepsin supplements still exist but are formulated for capsules, not for flavour, and at three dashes leaving it out changes little about how the drink tastes.
- DashesA dash from a fountain bottle is usually reckoned at roughly ⅛ teaspoon. On that reckoning three dashes of pepsin and two of curaçao come to a little over half a teaspoon between them — the curaçao is a whisper of orange over the lime, not a flavour in its own right.
- Lime syrupFountain lime syrup was a heavy sugar syrup flavoured with lime juice or lime oil, and was likely sweeter and less sharp than a modern cordial. One ounce is two tablespoons. If substituting a bottled cordial, the result may read as tarter than intended.
- Plain sodaCarbonated water straight from the tap, not a flavoured soda. Six ounces of it against one ounce of syrup gives a lightly sweet, briskly fizzy drink.
- Stir, strain, serveThe ice does not go into the glass. Stirring over shaved ice chills and dilutes; straining leaves a clear, cold drink with the carbonation partly knocked out of it, which is how these were meant to be served. Add the soda last and stir minimally if you want more bubbles.
- YieldOne glass, about 8 ounces after straining. Mix and drink at once — this does not hold.
Soda fountains in the United States grew out of pharmacies, and for decades the counter sold medicine as readily as refreshment. Pepsin, isolated in the nineteenth century and marketed heavily as a cure for dyspepsia, turned up in chewing gum, in tonics and, as here, in mixed fountain drinks aimed at customers who had eaten too well. The name is worth a second look: at the fountain a "phosphate" ordinarily meant a drink containing acid phosphate, the sour phosphoric-acid solution sold under names like Horsford's, yet no acid phosphate appears in this formula at all — lime syrup supplies the tartness, and the word survives as a category label for a sharp, non-creamy soda-water drink. The curaçao is a fountain flourish rather than a dose, a dash or two of cordial for colour and aroma at a counter that borrowed the bartender's vocabulary while remaining nominally temperate.