Layer upon layer of ridiculous ice-cream decadence: is it even possible to make the definitive knickerbocker glory?
An appropriately magnificent name for the king of ice-cream sundaes – almost 70 years on, my dad still hasn’t got over the fact that he was never allowed one on his annual childhood trip to the seaside. Too dear, at 2/6d, for little boys, apparently. Every time we go into Morelli’s, still going strong in all its 1950s splendour on Broadstairs seafront, he looks wistfully at the menu before ordering a coffee, yet when we finally treated him, he had to give up after two mouthfuls. Which is why you should indulge yourself now – there’s never been a better time.
Oddly enough, though the knickerbocker glory is now thought of as a very British treat, it seems to have its origins in the United States, spiritual home of the sundae (where it was, according to historian Janet Clarkson, probably created as a response to strict Sabbath trading laws): the first record seems to be in a 1915 handbook for soda fountain proprietors. The name wouldn’t have seemed so wonderfully strange over there, Knickerbocker being the Dutch-American hero of Washington Irving’s 1809 A History of New York, who, in turn, lent his name to knee breeches; Clarkson suggests the link might be the socks worn below these garments, which makes sense, because the knickerbocker glory’s defining feature is its colourful layers, striped with promise.
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