Every region has a drink that outsiders do not understand. Moxie in Maine. Cheerwine in the Carolinas. Vernors in Detroit. In Buffalo, it is loganberry: deep purple, sweet, a little tart, not carbonated, and served cold in a tall glass with a straw. If you grew up here you have opinions. If you did not, you have questions. Let us take the questions.
What is a loganberry?
A real fruit. The loganberry is a cross between a blackberry and a raspberry, discovered in the 1880s in the California garden of a judge named James Logan, who was trying to breed a better blackberry and got something else. It looks like a long, dark red raspberry and tastes like both of its parents: the sweetness of the raspberry, the depth of the blackberry, and more tartness than either.
Loganberries grow well in the Pacific Northwest and not particularly well in Western New York. Which raises the obvious question.
So how did it end up in Buffalo?
The usual story points to Crystal Beach, the old amusement park across the lake on the Canadian shore that generations of Buffalo families reached by ferry. Loganberry drink was sold there, the memory of it got bound up with summer and the boat ride and the Comet roller coaster, and when the park closed in 1989 the drink stayed behind as the thing people could still buy.
Local bottlers kept making it. It went into fountain machines at pizzerias and diners and Bills games. And because nobody outside the region was drinking it, it became a way of telling who was from here. Order a loganberry in Cleveland and you will get a blank look. Order one on Main Street in Buffalo and the person at the counter will just nod.
What it tastes like
Think of a grape drink with better manners. It is sweet, but the tartness keeps it from being syrupy, and there is a berry flavor underneath that is more complicated than grape or cherry. It is not carbonated, which surprises people who expect a soda. Served ice cold on a hot day, it is one of the great regional drinks in the country, and we will argue that with anyone from Maine.
Why it makes a great milkshake
Because the tartness cuts the ice cream. A vanilla shake with loganberry in it tastes like a berries-and-cream dessert, purple all the way through, and not as sweet as you would guess. It is one of the more popular flavors on the Flavor Board for a reason, and because every shake here is hand-dipped from real ice cream, the berry flavor has something to hold onto. Make it a malt if you want the toasty malt note underneath; it works.
Order one in Cleveland and you'll get a blank look. Order one here and the counter just nods.
Loganberry after dark
The drink is not only for the daytime. Our sister restaurant across the parking lot puts it in a cocktail, the Loganberry Mule at The Steer, with vodka and lime, and it is exactly as Buffalo as it sounds. A loganberry shake here at lunch and a Loganberry Mule there at nine is a very purple day, and a very local one.
The floats question
We get asked whether you can make a loganberry float. Our floats are built on Johnnie Ryan bottled soda, and loganberry is not carbonated, so a true float would be flat. What you want instead is a loganberry shake with a scoop of vanilla dropped on top at the end. Ask for it that way at the counter. We know what you mean.