Here at HOB alcoholic beverages have never really appealed.
On the other hand the endless varieties of lemonade around the world have.
Here’s a great piece by Gastro Obscura on the topic
Considered the first cocktail book ever written, it nonetheless includes the steps to make a non-alcoholic “delicious lemonade,” by whipping together gelatinous calves-feet jelly, raw eggs, water, and the requisite lemons and sugar.
Imagining this frothy concoction made me think of all the other recipes for lemonade I’ve come across in historical and modern cookbooks. The former can include everything from eggs to sherry, while the latter sometimes advise making lemonade with simple syrup or adding zest for a more intense flavor.
Simple or expensive, boozy or dry, egg-filled or thankfully egg-free, lemonade is immensely adaptable to the tastes of the times. Perhaps that’s why it has such a colorful history: Over the centuries, lemonade has been held to be both medicinal and pleasurable, incredibly humble while also the favorite subject of master painters. Make yourself a glass, and let’s dive into lemonade’s sweet history.
The History of Lemonade
The first written mention of lemonade-like drinks comes from On Lemon, Its Drinking and Use, an Arabic treatise written in the 12th century by the physician Ibn Jumay?, who wrote down a number of drink recipes that included not only lemon juice, but fruits, herbs, and spices.
Jumay? recommended lemonade for its health benefits, and that reputation followed it into Europe, along with sugar and the lemon itself. The price of its ingredients initially reserved it for the very rich and the very sick. But refreshing lemonade could not be contained to the sickroom for long, and by the 17th century, Paris was filled with wandering lemonade vendors, who sold the drink from elaborate tanks strapped to their backs.
The first published American recipe for lemonade, in 1824’s The Virginia House-wife, involved egg whites and freezing, resulting in a delicate sherbet more than a drink. But as the century continued, lemonade became useful both politically and economically.
Pleasant enough to drink on its own without alcohol, lemonade became an emblem of the temperance movement. Lucy Webb Hayes, First Lady from 1877 to 1881, bore the nickname “Lemonade Lucy” for her refusal to serve alcohol in the White House. Plus, “portable lemonade,” a dry mix of sugar, lemon, and citric acid, could be carried by soldiers and people on the frontier, for a refreshing drink that could also hide the taste of bad water.
Bottling lemonade, an early innovation, also made for a portable, potable refreshment. But these pre-made varieties have a hard time living up to the fresh-squeezed kind—there’s an invisible timer that starts once a lemon is sliced, since oxidation strips away the juice’s delicate flavor and often leaves unpleasant bitter notes.
Perhaps that’s why we seek out summer lemonade stands. Lemonade has been sold at stands stateside since the 19th century, but only became the leading business venture for children in the 20th. Even if the lemonade served to you in a paper cup by your neighbor’s kid is a little too sour and watery, don’t forget that you’re drinking history.
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