|
Yesterday for National Ice Cream Month we featured the “new” ice cream sandwich, a sandwich/sundae fusion.
Today, it’s the “new” banana split in the photo: freed from its roots.
The traditional banana split is a type of ice cream sundae made in a long dish called a boat (hence the alternate term, banana boat).
The banana is cut in half lengthwise (the “split”) and placed on the bottom of the boat. The banana is topped with three scoops of ice cream—vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry ice cream—placed in a row between the split banana halves. Chocolate, pineapple, and strawberry sauces are spooned over the ice cream, in no particular pairing. The sundae is garnished with whipped cream, crushed nuts, and a maraschino cherry.
Check out how to make a banana split party bar, below.
BANANA SPLIT HISTORY
The soda fountains of yore were the equivalent of today’s Starbucks, where people met for refreshments and socializing. Soda jerks were the mixologists of their day*, inventing treats to excite customers. Malted milks, banana splits, and phosphates emerged at the soda fountains of neighborhood drugstores in the 1890s.
In those days, “jerk” was not a derogatory term; it referred to the quick, sharp pull as the attendant drew the carbonated water tap forward.
David Evans Strickler, a 23-year-old apprentice pharmacist at Tassel Pharmacy in Latrobe, Pennsylvania†, enjoyed taking on the soda jerk role and inventing sundaes at the store’s soda fountain. He invented the banana-based triple scoop ice cream sundae in 1904.
The sundae originally cost 10 cents, twice the price of other sundaes, and caught on with students of nearby Saint Vincent College. In those pre-digital days, news of the nifty new sundae quickly spread by word-of-mouth and written correspondence.
It must have done well for Strickler: He went on to buy the pharmacy, renaming it Strickler’s Pharmacy.
Then, plan a banana split party, where guests create their modern interpretations. It could become your signature annual event!
The city of Latrobe celebrated the 100th anniversary of the invention of the banana split in 2004. In the same year, the National Ice Cream Retailers Association certified Latrobe as the birthplace of the banana split. It hosts an annual Great American Banana Split Festival in late August (sorry, there’s no website), and the city has the original soda fountain where the banana split was created.
Others tried their hand at the recipe. One, published in 1907, called for a lengthwise split banana, two cones of ice cream at each end of the dish, and a mound of whipped cream in between with maraschino cherry on top. One end was covered with chopped mixed nuts and the other with chopped mixed fruits. [Source: Wikipedia]
Here’s the history of the ice cream sundae, and the long history of ice cream in general.
PARTY TIME: BANANA SPLIT BAR
How about throwing a banana split party, where guests can invent their own banana splits? Here’s what you need to put together:
Ice cream, frozen yogurt, sorbet
Sauces: caramel sauce/salted caramel sauce, chocolate sauce, pineapple sauce (or crushed pineapple is a good stand-in), strawberry sauce
Bananas, split and/or sliced
Chopped nuts (traditional walnuts plus pecans, pistachios and/or slivered almonds)
Whipped cream
Maraschino cherries
Bowls, spoons, scoopers, etc.
Ingredients for the “new” banana split:
Bananas: caramelized, foster (sautéed in butter and bourbon), fried
Cake cubes (the easiest to slice are loaf cakes: carrot cake, chocolate cake, pound cake)
Candies: caramel corn/kettle corn, chocolate chips or curls, other baking chip flavors, gummies, mini marshmallows, M&Ms, Reese’s Pieces sprinkles, seasonal candies (like candy corn), toffee bits
Crumbled cookies: chocolate waters, meringues, oatmeal cookies, Oreos)
Fruits: berries; mango, melon and/or pineapple chunks
Wild card: brandied cherries and tart cherries, candied bacon, edible flowers, granola, marshmallow cream
____________
*Their day was the late 1800s through the early 1900s.
†Latrobe is approximately 40 miles southeast of Pittsburgh. The city population was 8,338 as of the 2010 census.
|
|
[1] The new banana split: exciting (photo © SushiSamba [now closed]).
[2] Traditional banana split (photo © California Milk Advisory Board).
[3] We like how I Heart Naptime switched it up with caramel sauce and chocolate chips. Here’s the recipe (photo © I Heart Naptime).
[4] This Breakfast Banana Split uses scoops of watermelon instead of hice cream. Here’s the recipe (photo © National Watermelon Promotion Board).
[5] Banana Split Sushi. Here’s the recipe (photo © RA Sushi). |
