Shrub

I was leafing through a cookbook at a Parsi friend's house here in Chennai, about ten years ago. It was The American Heritage Cookbook, of all things. (I looked for it at Amazon.com, but it seems to be out of print.) In the Drinks section I found an interesting-looking recipe for Lime-Rum Shrub, which was popular in eighteenth-century America. I made it, and found that it was really delicious - light and cool, and not very alcoholic. I've offered it a lot at parties, and someone would always ask me for the recipe.

It seemed to me that I had seen the word 'shrub' in books about British India. Before and during the American Revolution, a number of people were posted in America as well as India -- General Cornwallis, for example. I guessed that 'shrub' might have been derived from the Arabic 'sharaab,' or liquor. Today I got around to checking Hobson-Jobson, which confirmed it: Shraub. And the related Sherbet.

Another site I turned up today was a History of Alcohol in America entry on Punch, which astonished me with this:

Another universal and potent colonial drink was punch. It came to the English colonies in America from the English colonies in India... The word is from the Hindustani panch, five, referring to the five ingredients then used in the drink, namely: tea, arrack, sugar, lemons, water....(more)

This site mentions Shrub as being a punch -- though mine should be called Char, because it has only four ingredients.

Hobson-Jobson also has a long entry for Punch. (I suddenly wondered if 'to punch,' as in 'to hit,' might also be derived from paanch -- since a fist has five fingers -- but my dictionary thinks not.)

So, anyway, here's the recipe. It makes a bottle or two. It's really good, and you can keep it at room temperature in a tropical country for more than six months. It improves with age, but you can drink it immediately too, and imagine yourself at a quadrille in colonial America; or in a stifling ballroom in Calcutta, full of feverish gaiety, while punkahs languidly stir the air. For authenticity, of course, you would have to drink it at room temperature -- India began importing shiploads of ice from America only in the nineteenth century -- but it's best chilled:

Lime-Rum Shrub

1 1/2 cups sugar
2 1/2 cups water
4 cups dark rum
1 cup lime juice

Heat sugar and water together until sugar dissolves. Cool to room temperature. Strain all ingredients into a bottle. Keep for a week before drinking. (update: Serving size: a whiskey glass, or a punch cup.