Cider-Flip, Sweet Cider and Lemon for a 1903 Halloween Party
Reader ratingsFresh sweet apple cider in a tall pitcher with lemon slices and the juice of three lemons, served with straws, or hot on a cold night: the drink of a 1903 Halloween party book.
- Recipe makes
- About 8 1/2 cups, 10 glasses
- Prep
- Total
Chill the cider ahead if serving it cold; the lemon juice goes in just before serving.
Cider-Flip in a tall glass pitcher with lemon slices, two thin glasses with paper straws and a dish of red apples.
The story behind the recipe
Cider-Flip is a pitcher of fresh sweet apple cider with lemon slices in it and the juice of three lemons stirred in at the last minute. It comes from Stanley Schell’s Hallowe’en Festivities, a book of party plans published in New York in 1903, where it shares a page with molasses popcorn balls. Schell insists that the cider “must be fresh and very sweet,” which in American usage of the time meant apple juice that had not begun to ferment, so the Cider-Flip has no alcohol in it.
A flip without an egg
In the bar books of the 1900s, a flip meant a spirit or wine shaken with a whole egg and sugar. Schell’s has neither egg nor spirit, and the book doesn’t say why he called it a flip. The rest of his book is all apples and games: walnuts emptied and refilled with riddles, a fortune cake with a ring inside, invitations in white ink on black cards. The Cider-Flip belongs to his plan for a Hallowe’en supper, a pitcher for the table to be drunk “with straws” from “thin glasses.”
Read more about this recipe
Making it today
In the United States, sweet apple cider is sold as apple cider; elsewhere, look for cloudy, unfiltered apple juice and avoid anything labeled hard cider. The two quarts are US quarts, about 1.9 liters. Three lemons give roughly half a cup of juice, which takes the edge off a very sweet cider; with a sharper juice, start with less and taste. Schell lets it be served hot on a cold night, and that version is below.
Schell’s pitcher came at the end of a long line of apple drinks for the night, which starts with Irish lambswool in Apples, Ale and Nuts: The Old Drinks of Halloween. For a spiced hot cider in the same spirit, there is Mulled Sweet Cider from 1919.
CIDER-FLIP. Place two quarts of sweet cider in tall pitcher; add few slices of lemon; just before serving turn in juice of three lemons ...
Recipe makes: About 8 1/2 cups, 10 glasses
Ingredients
For About 8 1/2 cups, 10 glasses. Quantities are shown as written.
Quantities as written here, for About 8 1/2 cups, 10 glasses.
- Pasteurized sweet apple cider, chilled8 cups
- Lemon, thinly sliced1
- Fresh lemon juice, from about 3 lemons1/2 cup
Measurement notes
Ingredients as written here
- 8 cups pasteurized sweet apple cider, chilled
- 1 lemon, thinly sliced
- 1/2 cup fresh lemon juice, from about 3 lemons
Equipment
Pitcher
Citrus juicer
Tall glass
Saucepan
Instructions
Pour the chilled sweet apple cider into a tall pitcher and add the lemon slices.
Just before serving, stir in the fresh lemon juice. Taste, and add a little more lemon if the cider is very sweet.
Pour into thin glasses and serve with straws.
For a cold night, warm the cider with the lemon slices in a saucepan until it steams, take it off the heat, stir in the lemon juice and serve in heatproof cups.
Nutrition
90calories per serving
- Recipe makes
- About 8 1/2 cups, 10 glasses
- Servings
- 10
Roughly estimated from USDA FoodData Central values for apple juice and lemon juice, for one glass of about 7 fl oz.
Recipe notes
When adjusting quantities
This is Schell’s full recipe of two quarts. Halve or double everything together.
Notes
Quantities mentioned in these notes don’t change when you adjust the batch.
Changes from the source: the half cup of lemon juice is our measure for Schell’s “juice of three lemons”, and “a few slices” is taken as one sliced lemon. Chilling the cider is our choice; Schell serves it straight from the pitcher. For the hot version he says only that the cider can be made hot; warming the lemon slices with it and adding the juice off the heat are ours.
Use pasteurized cider or juice for the cold version. The FDA warns that unpasteurized juice and cider can carry harmful bacteria, and children, older people and anyone pregnant or with a weakened immune system should avoid it unless it has been heated.
Lemonade is served in another of Schell’s party plans; Mrs. Beeton’s Lemonade is a period one to make alongside.
Scaling changes the ingredients only; glassware, ice and timings need their own judgment. To adapt this recipe further, try the recipe tool at TuneMyRecipe (opens in a new tab), our sister site.
Sources and attribution
Stanley Schell, Hallowe’en Festivities, Werner’s Readings No. 31 (New York: Edgar S. Werner, 1903), “Cider-Flip”, p. 59
Recipe details
- Drink
- Alcohol-free
- Drink family
- Sodas & Soft Drinks
- Region
- American
- Source decade
- 1900s
- Base
- Fruit & juice
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Occasion
- Halloween
- Season
- Autumn