PISCO PUNCH
PISCO PUNCH
Pisco Punch is just one of the many culinary delights that originated in California, along with such treats as Hangtown Fry, cioppino, and Irish coffee. This delightful concoction was served for years at the gaslit Bank Exchange bar in the grand old Montgomery Block, once the largest and most luxurious office building in San Francisco. The Bank Exchange was famous around the world as the home of Pisco Punch. It was said that if you entered the foyer of any fine hotel in Europe and asked where you could get a shot of Pisco Punch, you'd always get the same reply: "Southeast corner of Montgomery and Washington streets, San Francisco, America!" No one knows for certain the origins of Pisco Punch, but it probably was first served in the 1850s by one of the original proprietors of the Bank Exchange, a fellow affectionately known as "Pisco John." He passed the closely guarded recipe on to Duncan Nicol, a Scotsman who presided over the bar from the 1870s until the place closed during Prohibition. At a final press conference, reporters asked Nicol for the secret ingredients of his potent ambrosia. "What makes it so terrific?" they asked. Nicol refused to divulge the recipe. The reporters badgered him with 32 more questions, asking "What difference does it make now?" But Nicol stood his ground. When he died in 1926, it seemed that the recipe for Pisco Punch died with him.For nearly half a century the recipe was lost and presumed gone forever. Then, in the early 1970s, San Francisco historian William Bronson made an amazing discovery. He found in the Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, a copy of the long-lost recipe for Pisco Punch. Should you care to give it a try, just follow these instructions!
3/4 pint lemon juice 1 bottle Peruvian Pisco Brandy William Bronson described Pisco Punch as "fragrant, seductive, and delicate." Some of its earlier devotees were a bit more graphic. One said that it was like a scimitar whose edge was so fine that after a slash a man could walk on unaware that his head had been severed from his body until his knees gave way and he fell to the ground dead. Another said that Pisco Punch was "joltingly smooth," it went down like nectar and came back with the kick of a Missouri mule! 3.3 * The secret ingredient here, gum (aka "gomme") syrup, is a nineteenth-century bar essential consisting of sugar syrup blended with gum arabic (the crystallized sap of the acacia tree) to smooth it out and add body. To make it, slowly stir 1 pound gum arabic into 1 pint distilled water and let soak for a day or two. When this solution is ready, bring 4 pounds sugar and 1 quart distilled water to a boil, add the gum solution, and skim off the foam. Let it cool, filter it through cheesecloth, and bottle it. It should keep, even unrefrigerated. You can find gum arabic powder in some health-food stores and at Frontiercoop.com. It's worth the hassle. Really. ** Recommended brands: Don Cesar Pisco Italia is the best we've found; La Botija is also very good.
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