Priscilla Normandy Greenwood's Family Album

Growing up in Williamsburg, Brooklyn

 Rocky Tricarico and His Famous Egg Creams
Rocky worked at Uncle Tom Tricarico's Candy Store on the corner of Conselyea and Lorimer Streets in Williamsburg. Rocky is on the right. Who's on the left?
From a 2002 email from Rocky (now Rocco because his son is Rocky):
"The counter is opened to the outside, signifying it was summer.  I guess the shirts told you that. I liked working there during the summer because of not feeling locked inside away from everyone. Uncle Tom's Egg Creams were the best ... and he taught me well!"

Click here for pictures of the corner from 1940 and 2014
New York Egg Cream

Rocky Tricarico's 
Famous NY Egg Creams 











The chocolate syrup was poured out of a gallon jug into the soda
fountain pump which was operated with the heel of your hand pressing
downward. Milk came fresh from the milkman with  three inches of heavy cream on top. We had to shake the bottle before each use. We used the "old-fashioned" Coca-Cola glasses.

About 1 1/4 inches of chocolate syrup is poured into the glass bottom, without it touching the sides of the glass. A long spoon is then put into the glass, resting in the bottom in the syrup. The spoon is not touched as about 1 1/4 inches of  milk is 'slid' down the side of the glass-- carefully, so as not to mix with the syrup.

Then, even more carefully, the seltzer is added, increasingly, to
mix with the milk and cause the pure white, thick, cream top.

Lastly, and very gently, the spoon is used to mix the chocolate with
the milky mix that lies beneath the creamy top.

Remove the spoon carefully, and lifting the glass carefully, encircle your upper lip with a white arc of cream, which may be licked off intermittently with more sips.

Now ... you've had the BEST egg Cream of ALL! 

Rocco
 
Fox's U-bet Chocolate Flavor SyrupOther egg cream enthusiasts insist the chocolate syrup has to be Fox's U-bet Chocolate Flavor Syrup. H. Fox and Company was founded in a Brownsville basement during the early 1900s, and according to Lyn Stallworth and Rod Kennedy Jr. in "The Brooklyn Cookbook," "You absolutely cannot make an egg cream without Fox's U-Bet."

The cookbook refers to Fox's grandson, David, for the story of the syrup's name:

"The name 'U-Bet' dates from the late-'20s, when Fox's grandfather got wildcatting fever and headed to Texas to drill for oil. 'You bet' was a friendly term the oilmen used. His oil venture a failure, he returned to the old firm, changing Fox's Chocolate Syrup to Fox's U-Bet. He said, 'I came back broke but with a good name for the syrup,' his grandson relates."

The recipe for U-Bet has remained the same since those early years: Brooklyn water, sugar, corn sweeteners, cocoa and some "secret things."

According to David Fox, the third-generation owner of the Fox's U-Bet Chocolate-Flavored Syrup Company, his secret ingredient is Brooklyn's water! 

Who invented egg creams? No one knows for sure. One story gives credit to a man living on the Lower East Side of New York, a Yiddish actor named Boris Thomashevsky, who brought the first Yiddish play to New York from London in 1882. Supposedly, Boris had enjoyed a similar drink in Paris and when he came to New York he tried to duplicate it and that's how the famous New York egg cream was born.

 

 

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Now Playing: "That Old Gang of  Mine"

That Old Gang of Mine
I've got a longin' way down in my heart
for that old gang that has drifted apart
They were the best pals that I ever had
I never thought that I'd want them
   so bad

Last night I strolled to that old neighborhood
There on that corner I silently stood
I felt so blue as the crowds hurried by
Nobody knew how I wanted to cry

Gee, but I'd give the world to see
That old gang of mine
I can't forget that old quartet
That sang "Sweet Adeline"

Goodbye forever, old fellows and gals
Goodbye forever, old sweethearts
   and pals
God bless them

Gee, but I'd give the world to see
That old gang of mine
 

Music by Ray Henderson.
Words by Billy Rose and Mort Dixon, 1923
 

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