Ponche a la romana — sparkling wine and pineapple ice cream, Chile's year-end toast
Chilean ponche a la romana: chilled sparkling wine over pineapple ice cream for New Year's Eve and Christmas. Serves 8, with an alcohol-free version.
Recipe in testing. We published it before cooking it in our kitchen. Once we cook it, we will adjust whatever it needs and remove this note.
What ponche a la romana is and when it is drunk
Ponche a la romana is a Chilean year-end drink: well-chilled sparkling wine poured over pineapple ice cream in a punch bowl, sometimes with chopped fruit, then ladled into glasses with a scoop of ice cream in each. As it melts, the ice cream turns the drink creamy, sweet and slightly tart while the wine loses its fizz, which is why it is drunk as soon as it is served. In Chile it is made at Christmas and, above all, to welcome the New Year, in the middle of summer, and the Chilean press counts it among the classics of those celebrations alongside cola de mono. It shares pineapple ice cream with the terremoto, the pipeño drink of the fondas. It contains alcohol, so it is for adults; for children it is made with sparkling water or pineapple soda.
Ingredients
Instructions
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Chill the punch bowl, wine and glasses
Put the sparkling wine and the punch bowl in the fridge at least 3 hours before serving, and the glasses 30 minutes before. Cold is the key to this drink: sparkling wine at 5-7 °C holds its gas better, foams less when it hits the ice cream and keeps its bubbles in the glass, and a cold bowl slows down the melting. If the bowl does not fit in the fridge, fill it with ice and water 20 minutes ahead and empty it just before assembling the punch. If you are short of time with the wine, plunge the bottle into a bucket of ice and water for 30 minutes: it chills faster than the freezer, where a forgotten bottle can freeze and burst.
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Cut the fruit
If you are using fruit, peel the pineapple, remove the hard core and cut it into 1 cm cubes, or wash the strawberries, hull them and cut them into quarters. Wash and dry the mint leaves. Keep everything in the fridge until the last moment so it does not warm the punch. The fruit is optional, but fresh pineapple adds acidity and a fresh bite that balance the sweetness of the ice cream; if it is canned, drain it well, because the syrup makes the drink too sweet.
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Scoop the ice cream
Take the ice cream out of the freezer 5 minutes ahead so the scoop goes in easily. With an ice cream scoop, make 8 large balls, one per glass, and put them in the cold bowl. The balls float and are easy to share out with the ladle; a block of ice cream, by contrast, melts unevenly and makes it hard to give every glass the same amount. If you prefer it drier and fizzier, use half a litre of ice cream: 8 small balls.
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Pour in the sparkling wine slowly
Open the wine by holding the cork in your hand and turning the bottle, not the cork, so it does not pop out. Pour it slowly down the side of the bowl, not straight onto the ice cream, in three or four stages, and wait for the foam to settle between each one: the rough surface of the ice cream releases the wine's gas all at once, and if you pour it all in at once the foam spills over. Add the fruit and do not stir; the ice cream melts by itself and makes the punch creamy. For the alcohol-free version, do the same in a separate bowl with 750 ml of sparkling water or pineapple soda.
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Serve at once
Serve straight away with a ladle: in each glass, one ball of ice cream, wine up to two thirds and a little fruit, with a mint leaf on top. Use wide glasses of about 250 ml, such as wine glasses or champagne coupes, because a ball will not fit in a flute. Drink it freshly served, while the ice cream is still floating: as it melts, the punch becomes sweeter and creamier and loses its fizz. If the bowl has to last all night, make it in batches of half a bottle and half a litre of ice cream at a time.
Nutrition information
| Calories | 190 kcal |
|---|---|
| Protein | 1 g |
| Carbs | 31 g |
| Sugars | 28 g |
| Fat | 0 g |
| Trans fat | 0 g |
Values per serving (1 of 4).
Frequently asked questions
What goes into ponche a la romana?
The basics are well-chilled sparkling wine and pineapple ice cream: in this recipe, one 750 ml bottle and 1 litre of ice cream for 8 glasses, with fresh pineapple or strawberries and mint leaves as options. Some versions add white wine, blended pineapple or a syrup, but the simplest is just sparkling wine and ice cream. A water-based pineapple ice cream (sorbet) works best: it keeps the punch clean and foamy, while a cream-based one makes it thick and can form lumps when it meets the wine.
How strong is it, and which sparkling wine should I use?
Each glass holds about 95 ml of 12% sparkling wine, a little less than a glass served on its own; once the ice cream has melted, the punch is around 6% alcohol, a bit more than an ordinary beer. Use a brut or extra brut sparkling wine, because the ice cream brings all the sweetness: with a demi-sec it turns cloying. There is no need for an expensive bottle, and French Champagne would be wasted, since the ice cream masks its nuances. It is a drink for adults, even if it tastes like dessert.
How do I make ponche a la romana without alcohol?
Replace the sparkling wine with 750 ml of sparkling water or pineapple soda, well chilled, and follow the same steps. With sparkling water it is less sweet and the pineapple in the ice cream comes through more; with pineapple soda it is sweeter and fruitier. It also works with lemon-lime soda or ginger ale. Make it in a separate bowl and serve the children's glasses apart so they are not mixed up with the adults'.
Can I make it ahead of time?
Not assembled: the ice cream melts, the wine loses its fizz and the punch turns flat and watery. Everything else can be done ahead: chill the bowl, the wine and the glasses in the afternoon, cut the fruit a few hours before and scoop the ice cream balls in advance, keeping them on a lined tray in the freezer. When it is time for the toast, all that is left is to put the balls in the bowl and pour in the wine.
What is the difference between ponche a la romana and a terremoto?
Both use pineapple ice cream, but the wine, the way they are served and the occasion change. The terremoto is made with pipeño, a young, sweet white wine, served in a tall glass with a straw and sometimes grenadine or fernet, and it is the drink of the fondas at Fiestas Patrias. Ponche a la romana uses sparkling wine, is assembled in a punch bowl to share and is ladled into glasses, above all at Christmas and to welcome the New Year. The punch is lighter and fizzier.
Why is it called ponche a la romana?
The name is older than the Chilean drink. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Paris cafés and multi-course dinners served punch à la romaine, or Roman punch: a semi-frozen punch of rum, lemon and orange juice, syrup and beaten egg white, finished with Champagne, taken between courses to refresh the palate; it even appeared on the Titanic's first-class menu in 1912. The Chilean version shares the idea of an iced drink with sparkling wine, but with pineapple ice cream. How and when the name passed to this drink is not documented.
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