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Maraschino Punch
Put one pound of sugar in a basin with one quart of water and add the juice of a lemon and an orange and one breakfast cupful of maraschino. When it is well mixed strain it into a freezer again, when it will be ready for use.
A frozen punch of the kind served mid-banquet rather than a drink poured over ice. Almost everything that needs explaining here is vocabulary.
- Maraschino means the liqueurThis is maraschino liqueur — the clear, dry, faintly bitter cherry spirit from the Adriatic, of which Luxardo is the best-known surviving producer. It is not the sweet red syrup from a jar of cocktail cherries, which would make the punch cloying and pink.
- A breakfast cupfulA breakfast cup is the large cup of a Victorian tea service, generally taken as 8 to 10 fluid ounces. Around a cup of liqueur to a quart of syrup is the sense of it; err low and taste, since modern maraschino runs 32 percent alcohol.
- "A freezer" is a machine, not a compartmentThe freezer is the hand-cranked ice-cream churn packed with ice and rock salt. An ice-cream maker does the same job; failing that, freeze in a shallow pan and rake with a fork every twenty minutes for a granita texture.
- The word "again"The "again" is not explained by anything in the text as printed; it may point back to an earlier recipe in the same section, or be a slip of the pen. Read it simply as: mix, strain, freeze.
- Sugar weightA pound of granulated sugar is about 2 1/4 cups. With a quart of water that is a heavy syrup, deliberately so — the churn needs the sugar and the alcohol needs the sweetness to balance.
- It will never freeze hardA cup of 32 percent spirit, on top of a heavy sugar syrup, depresses the freezing point considerably. Expect a spoonable slush rather than a hard set.
- Strain, and mean itCitrus pulp and pith seize into fibrous threads in a churn. Pass the mixture through a fine sieve or muslin before it goes anywhere near the freezer.
- Yield and serviceAbout a quart and a half, enough for eight to ten small glasses. Serve in chilled stemmed glasses with a spoon, between courses rather than with dessert.
Frozen punches like this one belong to the long formal dinner of the late nineteenth century, where a small iced spirit — Roman punch was the most famous of them — was served as a pause and a palate-cleaner, traditionally said to come before the roast course. Maraschino itself comes from the Dalmatian coast, distilled from marasca cherries with their crushed stones, and by the 1890s it was a fixture of American bar and pastry work alike; its dry, almondy edge is what keeps a punch this sweet from collapsing into syrup.