baked Alaska

Meaning

Noun

• A dessert consisting of ice cream encased in cake and meringue and briefly baked.

Origin

• Said to have been coined by Charles Ranhofer (1836–1899), the French-American chef de cuisine of Delmonico’s, a restaurant in New York City, New York, United States, to mark the latter’s purchase of Alaska from the Russian Empire on 30 March 1867. However, there is no contemporary report of this fact, and in his book The Epicurean (1894) Ranhofer referred to the dish, versions of which pre-dated the Alaska Purchase, as an “Alaska, Florida”, apparently because of the contrast between its cold and hot elements. The dish appears to have been first called an Alaska or baked Alaska some time after the Alaska Purchase.