Shirley Temple

Historical Perspective

The Shirley Temple Cocktail, a non-alcoholic treat for preteens that still bears her name today, is considered as one of the most famous Mocktails ever to have been created. Shirley Temples are often – and traditionally ¬– served to children who are dining with adults, but in recent years the drink has made somewhat of a come back at skittish baby showers in America. How the iconic child star came to be associated with this innocent mixture of grenadine and lemonade is still shrouded in deep mystery today. Reputable Hollywood celebrities hangouts from the 30s claimed to have created and serving the Shirley Temple for the first time and include famous eateries like Chasen’s and the Brown Derby. A bartender at Beverly Hills restaurant Chasen’s is said to have created the cocktail for Shirley Temple’s 10th birthday, somewhere in April 1938, while celebrating with her parents, surrounded by other eminent personalities and movie stars. The Royal Hawaiian Hotel in Waikiki also spread the word on how one of its bartenders supposedly invented the Shirley Temple, for the very first time. Young Miss Temple, alongside her parents, once was a frequent guest at the Royal Hawaiian, an icon of comfort and romance and till this very day still one of the flagships of Hawaii tourism. The actress herself never displayed any particular liking for the cocktail and once expressed her feelings by stating that she actually never liked the drink. Temple also opposed the turbid culture – which she considered questionable – that was created around it. From Temple’s very first teenage years, she even demonstrated to be publicly against the concept and marketing of non-alcoholic cocktails for children. She also opposed vigorously several commercial attempts to “the abuse of her name,” as Temple called it, by American companies introducing a range of unauthorized bottled sodas, referring to her name. Temple’s mainspring would always remain that “All a celebrity has is their name,” as she once unfolded to a reporter from the New York Times. Nowadays, even the proper ingredients remain somewhat in dispute, although 7Up may have been used in the original recipe coming from Chasens’. Dashes of grenadine, a maraschino cherry, and slices of lime also pop up in most leading sources. First recipes published in the late 30s contain lemon-lime soda, but ginger ale, plain regular soda water, and even orange juice make their appearance as well. Modern Shirley Temple recipes include the Shirley Temple Black (her name after she got married), in which ginger beer replaces the soda, while rum and maraschino are added as well and the Dirty Shirley, a tall mixture of vodka, Sprite (or 7Up) and grenadine.