Gellati, galata, glaces, clo-clo, cassata, are all names by which ice cream
has toured our streets, cooled our summer promenades, made some specialized
parlours famous, and been immortalized in songs from as far back as the forties
by Abdul Wahab playing a dentist to the pretty Ra'ya Ibrahim suffering from a
toothache, to the more recent film Ice Cream fi Glym. In fairly typical
Egyptian manner, the origin of the word seems to have been no cause for much
discourse of ethnic nature, and in even more typical Alexandrian fashion, two
more words were equally used, their specialty all the more Alexandrian and
sought-out in the festival season by visitors from Cairo and elsewhere: namely
the Dandorma (of Turkish descent) and the granita, a variation on the sorbet.
The word Bouza did not make it across the borders to mean ice cream as in its
native Syria, and remained quite distinct from what vocabulary we instinctively
and almost inexplicably choose whether or not to embrace and adopt.
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| Ice Cream - Kaymak |
En passant, in the mid seventies, after once having successfully
launched the clo clo, Fluckiger introduced the frozen Parfait, but what with
chocolate mousse and profiteroles already existing desserts, the parfait failed
to impress. Perhaps a too perfect, difficult to pronounce Frenchy name may have
antagonized the casual customer by then not as francophone as his earlier
counterpart. After all, gelati and Turkish dandorma were easier on the tongue,
as were many words derived from the Italian. Granita, often pronounced
garanita, would jocularly sometimes be used as an answer to the question: “Gara
eh?” (what happened?) to which garanita was assumed to mean “nothing (nita)
happened (gara)”. However, one fact remains: there is no commonly known word
for ice cream, at least in our everyday language of which one is really aware.
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| Fluckinger |
In time, when ice cream became an industry, one of the first to package
and sell its products, at least in sanitary conditions one could trust, was
Groppi. Small-sized containers sold in fridges placed by the entrance of the
better known grocers such as Menassa, Eino and Simonds, as well as other
patisseries leave a typical olfactory memory of their mango and strawberry
flavors in particular. Along the Corniche, Groppi was not an unknown brand to
be feared, and carts drawn by street vendors were acknowledged safe and of
higher quality than some ice cream sold in parlors. Later still, “soft ice
cream” would break new ground around the country, and in Alexandria machines
were set up in Montaza and Maamoura. They had their fans, especially of children
since the technology of dispensing the ice cream through a machine was
considered new and exciting. However, they did not find favor for very long and
soon a much improved industry would take over.
During the golden years of Alexandrian gourmet refinement, and elite
confisseurs, Maison Baudrot offered a specialty of fruit-shaped ice cream
presented in a basket made of croquant, a nut and honey-based sweet that chefs
were adept at wielding into different shapes, such as cones that they would
fill with chocolate from a piping bag. Pastroudis was famous for its fruit
sorbets, inspired perhaps by the necessity for a cooling less creamy glace to
scoop and sip through a straw as one sat outdoors rather than in a salon de thé
such as were Le Petit Trianon and Baudrot.
Délices too had its own variety of ice cream that came in what was
called a Bombe that would be dispatched to complement a typical children's
birthday party menu complete with Louis Quatorze and Alexandre le Grand canapés
for the more Europeanized Alexandrian already familiar with the specialty from
other similar events. The Bombe would typically arrive in a heavy fridge with
insular lining looking like some piece of army artillery, and which was sure to
cause great glee on arrival at the birthday site. Often, marrons deguises
(chocolate coated chestnuts) would be sent as a compliment “on the house”. |
| Cassatta |
Casatta, too was a favourite with many, and because it offered a variety
of more than one flavour, and came in a single bar, flat shaped slab, it was
easy and less messy to eat. Elite was famous for their Trois Petis Cochons:
three scoops of multi flavored “home-made” ice cream presented in a mound.
Asteria had its specialty of chocolat mou, topped with fresh cream and probably
quite unique to this day. Ice cream soda: scoops of any flavour to taste placed
in a tall glass, then flushed with soda water and served with grenadine
sherbet, then stirred with an accompanying pair of drinking straws which often
a cozy couple in a remote corner of Asteria would share, was also typically
served.
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| Modern Ice Cream Parlours |
Ice cream parlours, such as the earlier Garbis of great Alexandrian
renown on La Gaieté Street in Ibrahimieh, followed by Saber in Ibrahimieh,
originally on an adjacent street corner from the shop where the owner worked as
a little boy and who became a success in Alexandria and with Cairenes in the
summer adding his own touch of rice pudding topped with ice cream and nuts were
always a treat to finish off a dinner had elsewhere in the city. Prices were
affordable, and service pleasant and courteous. One had a choice between ice
cream in a glass coupe or a plastic cup easier to drive or walk away with, or
better still, scooped into a thin cone shaped crisp wafer. Apparently those
were privy only to Alexandria, virtually unknown except to Cairenes who spent
their summer in Agami, at least until very recently. Apparently these cornets
used to be known as Shebbak el Bascote. Long ago, too, they used to sell them
dipped in molasses, and place a coin inside the cone that would stick by virtue
of the honey and be almost invisible to the eye. Children would rush to buy
them and the lucky one would get the cone with the coin.
In Agami Bless, a small little shop by the name of Bisso was almost all
there was by way of non packaged ice cream, that kept up the competition with
other growing brands in fancy plastic containers such as Nestlé, Dolce, Hawaii,
and more recently Mövenpick and Sultana. Sultana first set up shop in Kafr
Abdou, before acquiring more widespread outlets in Cairo, Marina and Carrefour
where they have a stand dedicated to chocolate ice cream. Apart from ice cream
cakes, decorated with dried apricots and prunes in Ramadan, a month when Ice cream
as dessert will only be favoured when the holy month occurs during the summer,
Sultana also has a low sugar diabetic /diet variety, and a seyami line for the
periods of Coptic fasting.
The word “mixte” once upon a time finally uttered after some hesitation
between what an ice cream parlour had to offer, and often associated with the
favourite combination of chocolate and milk, or lemon granita and strawberry
sorbet, is now nostalgically a thing of the past. What with many flavors on the
market such as guava, hibiscus (at Saber's), blackberry (if in season), apricot
and melon, not to mention the introduction of Baskin Robbins' 33 FLAVORS in the
1990s which was an instant success. Given its prices, however, the success was
not too long-lived. Gone too, are the biscuits cuillére, flanking ice cream
scoops at Délices to which true to style Alexandrians preferred the equally
French if more quaint and languorously evocative name of langue de chat.
Of all the fancy French ice creams, and the newer multi-national ones,
the most popular today are the simple vanilla with mastic ice cream, sold in
the small white biscuit, the large brown biscuit cone, or the small plastic
cups. They are sold in modest parlours with white plastic chairs and tables
placed on the kerb. Most commonly, however, cars will drive up to the tiny
shop, and the waiter will deliver the ice cream right up to the car. That is
part of the leisure of being Alexandrian.
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| Early picture of El Mahdy Ice Cream Factory |
Granita El Mahdy: The grandfather arrived from Upper Egypt on foot, a
thirteen-year-old orphan in search of a means of livelihood to support the
family that his father had left behind. El Mahdy needed to find work, as he
couldn’t very well go back empty handed. He started working with a Greek man
who sold ice cream in Bahari but, being an ambitious boy who already knew he
wanted to start his own business, he walked along the Corniche in search of the
perfect spot to set up his ice-cream kiosk. Glym was the place he finally
chose, and he built a wooden kiosk and acquired a fridge in 1926. At first he
would buy the ice cream from his Greek ex-employer and sell it, then his
ambitious streak got the better of him and he began to think of making his own
ice cream. He bought two barrels, one wooden and the other copper, and put the
copper barrel inside the wooden one, filling the space in between with layers
of salt and ice, just like they used to in the old days.
Soon it was time for experimentation with new flavors. El Mahdy used
lemon juice, sugar and gelatin, but not milk, thinking that lemon and milk
would not go well together. The result was not ice cream, but people loved it!
He worked on this recipe, sold it in ice cream cones, and called it Dandorma.
Then Mr. Glymonopoulos, a Greek whose mother was Italian, told him that in Italy
they called it Granita. (Glymonopoulos owned a supermarket, and his villa was
opposite to Shehab the Butcher’s now).
One day King Farouk looked out from the hotel opposite the kiosk, and
saw a crowd around the kiosk. So he strolled down and bought himself a granita,
and paid five pounds (which is still with the family). It was only when the
people applauded that El Mahdy realized it was the king. From that time on, he
was patronized by pashas and beys, while commoners didn’t frequent the area
much, anyway.
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| Ice Cream Vendor |
The wife of Mustafa Fahmy Pasha asked El Mahdy why he didn’t have a
shop, and he said that he could not get a license to open a shop on Mustafa
Fahmy Street. She managed to get him the license, and permission to open a shop
in the garage of Mustafa Fahmy Pasha. Eventually, he moved closer to the
Corniche, and bought the shop they currently own in 1948. In addition to ice
cream and granita, El Mahdy was the second place in Alexandria to make sugar
cane juice, which was at first pressed manually. It was the first shop to
switch to machine pressed juice. Now they also make mango and tangerine flavor
granita, in addition to the original lemon flavor.
El Mahdy made granita for Sporting Club, and that is why many people
will find that both granitas taste the same. In the 1960s a famous ful and
falafel shop, Scheherazade, was next to El Mahdy, and it was an Alexandrian
tradition to eat ful and falafel sandwiches then have the granita for dessert.
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| Original Ice Cream Vendor in Gamasa |
Mahmoud Ali Mahdy, the current owner, who is the grandson, has seen
President Anwar el Sadat, and Gihan el Sadat, buy granita at El Mahdy (Sadat
arrived in a sky blue Volks Wagon). He heard that President Gamal Abdel Nasser
also came buy one day, but he didn’t see the late president himself. Amr Diab,
the famous singer of the nineties, immortalized El Mahdy in the film Ice Cream
fi Glym.
At the other end of town, in Bahari, Azza started with a Syrian but when
he left Tarek Gamal’s grandfather took over the business, and now it has been
expanding, with shops all over the city. Though not the first to open in Bahari
(it opened in the 1960s, while Nezami and Makram have been there since the
1940s), Azza started as a cart. Only the best material is used: mastic from
Greece, sahlab from Syria, and natural material rather than artificial colors.
They have also added a date flavor imported from Iraq. Abla Kamel’s new movie,
Bolteyya El ‘Ayma, was filmed at their branch next to the Yacht Club, and Nelly
Karim in Akher el Donia was shown eating ice cream there.
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| Ice Cream with Pistachio topping |
Psychology and national character do come into play as regards success
in the food and eating department, and Alexandrians seem to have a natural
hunch for it, but it is not just that. A deep understanding that goes a long
way back into a way of life rooted in the city's persona and its social
heritage also contribute to the holistic ensemble of enabling factors for the
common experience of the shared time and place.
Full Credit to the authors of the Original Articles from the site "Gastronomy" Bibliotheca Alexandrina
