Bitter lemon

[Mike Salovesh]

Lynne Murphy wrote:

> Whenever I'm in the States, I look for bitter lemon, but for the last 10 years > or so it's been impossible to find in supermarkets.  I did find it in         > Bellingham, WA, which I guessed was because of its proximity to Canada.

Lynne, bitter lemon (and quite specifically the Schweppes brand) is
widely available across the U.S.  Supermarkets just aren't the place to
find it; it's commonly sold in liquor stores.  (Well, you might have to
seek out a really large liquor store -- the equivalent of an alcoholic
supermarket, perhaps.)

I've hunted it down many times because bitter lemon is one of the five
liquid ingredients in the secret recipe for the famous (or infamous)
punch that once was a staple at celebrations hosted by Albert H.
Marckwardt.

There was a slight error in transmission that put an end to Marckwardt's
use of the recipe in the summer of 1957.  The Linguistic Society of
America ran its Linguistics Institute at the University of Michigan that
year.  Marckwardt was extremely busy as Director of the Institute.  When
he hosted a cocktail party for LSA officers and those who would be the
guests of honor at the annual banquet, he asked Norman McQuown to
prepare the punch for that occasion.  McQuown, in turn, asked me to
assist him -- he was my major professor at the time.  Peggy, my wife,
brought a third pair of hands to the task.

Having agreed not to reveal the punch's ingredients, we weren't able to
seek competent advice about the fine points of executing the recipe.  We
did the best we could by following the basic recipe exactly and
precisely.  The punch was smooth and tasty, marked by the exotic
overtones of both the Schweppes bitter lemon and the unusual combination
of the other  secret ingredients.  There was no noticeable tang of
alcohol to the mixture.

That sumbitch had a kick like the lowest Army mule that ever lived.

At the end of the cocktail party, the LSA board and guests of honor
tried to support each other as they walked across campus to the
banquet.  They got there, with only a minimum of personal injuries.  (I
think the worst of those injuries came from one distinguished senior
scholar walking into a tree, but my memory of that evening is not as
clear as it might be.)  Their joint arrival at the annual banquet, only
a little less than an hour late, should stand forever as a tribute to
the experienced linguist's ability to navigate through the thickest fog,
verbal or otherwise.

Unfortunately, once the group was seated at the head table, the guest of
honor scheduled to deliver a distinguished address after the dinner
promptly fell asleep with his head in the soup.

The next day -- NOT at any bright and early hour -- Marckwardt asked
McQuown and me what we had done to his famous punch.  We denied having
done anything to violate the recipe he had written out for us.  He then
asked us to review what we had done, step by step, and we listed the
quantities we had used for each ingredient.  Then he asked where we had
gotten the ice, and how long we had let the punch mellow before serving
it.  We said we had taken several trays of ice cubes from the freezer,
adding them perhaps half an hour before serving.

Ooops.

We had gotten all the listed ingredients exactly right.  What Marckwardt
had failed to tell us was that we should have mixed all those
ingredients, then poured them over a fifty pound block of ice sometime
in the morning, so that the mixture could blend and mellow all day.  In
the heat of an Ann Arbor summer, the ice block would have had time to
melt and dilute the stiff concentration of the alcoholic parts of the
recipe.

Marckwardt's punch used non-alcoholic bitter lemon, it's true -- but as
a flavoring more than a major portion of the liquid's volume.  What
McQuown and the Saloveshes had served to our innocent victims was a
hefty dose of alcohol with just enough of some other ingredients to hide
the alcoholic taste.  The punch tasted like a refreshing fruit mixture,
and we all drank it as if it were fruit juice.

It sure didn't act like fruit juice.

We've served that punch many times since then.  Apparently, the recipe
has lost none of its potency over the years. I no longer think of it as
Al Marckwardt's punch: it has become our family specialty.

I won't reveal the secret ingredients, but I don't mind sharing the
special features of preparation that give Salovesh Punch its punch.
First, never pour the punch over a fifty pound block of ice.  Second,
make sure that all the liquid ingredients are thoroughly chilled before
the punch is mixed.  (Alcoholic ingredients are best chilled in a
freezer -- after all, they're well equipped with antifreeze.)
Pre-chilling spares one the effort of emptying more than one or two
trays of ice cubes.

Thank heaven you can still find bitter lemon if you know where to look.
I'd hate to have to give up mixing a punch with such a distinguished
history.

-- mike salovesh   <salovesh at niu.edu>        PEACE !!!

P.S.: Peggy, reading over my shoulder, reminds me of an alternative way
of preparing this punch.

Telling you that one of the ingredients is a wine doesn't really reveal
the recipe's secret, because there are so many kinds of wine. When you
want the punch to hold its chill for several hours of tasting, freeze
the wine in ring molds. (The wine's alcoholic content will keep it from
freezing to a hard solid; it will be closer to an icy wine slush.) The
frozen wine releases its flavor and its alcohol as it melts, and keeps
the punch properly chilled at the same time.