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Geering Punch
Place in large goblet a half tablespoon fine sugar, the juice of half a sound lemon, half pony yellow chartreuse and a pony glass of Martell brandy, stir well with spoon, add a lump of ice, bottle of Club soda and serve.
A single-serving brandy punch built in the glass, in the style of an American hotel bar around 1900. The measures are bar measures rather than kitchen ones.
- A ponyA pony glass is 1 fluid ounce (30 ml). So this is 1 oz Martell cognac and 1/2 oz yellow Chartreuse.
- The gobletA large goblet of the period probably held something in the range of 10-12 oz, though sizes were not standardised. Any tall glass or large wine goblet that leaves room for a full small bottle of soda will do.
- Bottle of Club sodaClub soda was commonly sold in small 'split' bottles of roughly 6 to 7 oz, as well as in larger bottles and siphons; it was not the litre bottle on shelves now. Pour about 6 oz and stop, or the drink is water.
- Fine sugarSuperfine (caster) sugar, which dissolves in the lemon juice without grinding. Half a tablespoon is about 1 1/2 teaspoons; 1/2 oz of simple syrup gives the same sweetness with less stirring.
- Yellow ChartreuseStill made by the Carthusians and still around 40% ABV, sweeter and lower in proof than the green. The green version is 55% and will dominate the cognac; they are not interchangeable here.
- Order of workDissolve the sugar in the lemon juice before any spirit goes in, and add the ice and soda last. Sugar that has not dissolved settles under the ice and the first half of the drink tastes thin.
- MartellA Cognac house then as now. Any VS or VSOP cognac stands in; the recipe wants a grape brandy, not apple or fruit brandy.
- YieldOne drink, of roughly 8 oz finished volume, containing about 1 1/2 oz of spirits.
Punch in this period had drifted a long way from the shared bowl its name came from -- the word is generally traced to Hindi panch, five, for the five elements of spirit, sugar, citrus, water and spice that East India Company traders drank in the seventeenth century. On an American bar list of the turn of the century, "punch" often meant exactly this: one glass, one spirit base, lemon, sugar, ice and soda, made to order. The liqueur float is the mark of the era, when a half-pony of something aromatic and expensive was added to lift an otherwise plain brandy-and-soda; yellow Chartreuse, made by the Carthusians and widely imported before Prohibition, was a standard bar bottle for the purpose. Who Geering was is not recorded here, though drinks named for hotel regulars, sporting men and visiting dignitaries filled bar books of the day.