Home › At the Fountain › Wild Cherry Syrup (II)
Wild Cherry Syrup (II)
American Wild Cherry Extract, 1 ½ ounces; Simple Syrup, 1 gallon; American Fruit Acid, 2 ounces; Ruby Color and Soda Foam, each, ½ ounce.
This is a fountain formula rather than a kitchen recipe: a gallon batch of flavored syrup meant to be drawn by the ounce and hit with carbonated water. Two of the five ingredients are proprietary trade preparations that no longer exist under those names, so read the list as a ratio rather than a shopping list.
- The proportions, in plain terms1 1/2 fluid ounces of extract is about 3 tablespoons, and 2 ounces of acid solution about 1/4 cup, into 128 ounces of syrup. The flavoring load is deliberately light because the syrup is diluted again at the glass.
- Simple syrup at fountain strengthFountain simple syrup of this era was generally made heavier than the thin 1:1 syrup used in bars today, though this formula does not specify a strength. A batch made with equal weights of sugar and water may taste thin once carbonated water is added.
- American Fruit AcidA druggist's house solution, probably a dilute citric or citric-and-tartaric acid in water, sold ready-mixed. A solution of citric acid is the nearest modern equivalent; substituting 2 ounces of dry acid powder would make the syrup considerably more sour.
- Ruby ColorSkip it. Fountain colors of this period were dyes sold loose to soda men, and some of the reds in use before federal certification are no longer permitted in food. Cherry juice or a certified food color does the same visual job.
- Soda FoamA saponin preparation, usually extract of quillaia (soap bark), used to give the drink a head that survived the seltzer. Quillaia extract is still a permitted soft-drink additive at controlled levels, but the trade product here was unstandardized and is best left out.
- Wild cherry extractMade from the bark of Prunus serotina, not the fruit, which is why the flavor is closer to almond-bitter than to sweet cherry. The bark is cyanogenic, so use a commercial food-grade flavoring extract rather than a homemade bark tincture of unknown strength.
- Dilution and yieldThe standard draw was about 1 to 1 1/2 ounces of syrup to a 6 to 8 ounce glass of carbonated water. A gallon batch therefore makes roughly 85 to 128 drinks.
- Keeping itThere is no preservative here beyond the sugar. Refrigerate the finished syrup and expect a few weeks; fountains turned batches over quickly and did not need to.
Soda fountains grew out of pharmacies, and wild cherry was one of the flavors that carried its drugstore ancestry openly. Syrup of wild cherry bark was a standard pharmacopoeial article, valued as a cough remedy and as a bitter-aromatic vehicle for less palatable drugs, and the dispenser who kept a bottle of the fluidextract for prescriptions had it on hand for the fountain as well. Formula books like this one were written for that man: they assume he buys extracts, acids, colors and foam preparations by the ounce from a supply house and blends them to a house standard, which is why the entry names brand categories rather than describing how anything is made.