| Each weekday morning at 8:15, Albert Doumar arrives at his
family's Norfolk restaurant and greets the customers and waitresses. Then he lights the
propane burner under an ancient machine. As it heats, he moves to the kitchen and gives a
few last stirs to the batter that he made the night before. He is here to make ice cream
cones. When everything is ready he splats a spoonful of
batter (he calls it "dough") onto one of four waffle irons in the machine. He
spins the iron on its pivot and thrusts the assembly back over the flame, then repeats the
process with the other irons. He peels a mini-waffle off the first iron, wraps it around a
conical mold and sets it into a rack where the waffle will stiffen. Soon he gets into a
rhythm -- stirring, splatting, spinning, peeling.
He makes about three cones every 60 seconds. "You can do four a
minute, if you know what you're doing," he says. Doumar, 79, knows what he's doing,
since he's been doing it since he turned 15. And he can tell you a thing or two about ice
cream cones, because his family may have invented them.
Although there are conflicting claims, there is no doubt in Doumar's
mind that his Uncle Abe introduced the ice cream cone to the world at a souvenir stand
during the 1904 St. Louis Exposition. Many of the putative inventors were Syrian
immigrants, like Abe Doumar, or Turkish or Lebanese. To Albert, this is merely logical:
Middle Eastern people already had a tradition of eating foods wrapped in pita bread.
After the ice cream/waffle cone combo proved popular at the exposition,
Uncle Abe and his brothers sold them at stands near their New Jersey home, at New York's
Coney Island and at expos, fairs and amusement parks up and down the East Coast. The
Norfolk operation began as a stand at Ocean View Park, which is now a quiet stretch of
beach near the Hampton Roads bridge-tunnel but once was the grandest amusement park south
of Atlantic City. After hurricanes obliterated the park, the Doumars, in 1934, relocated
to their present location in Norfolk's Ghent neighborhood.
Today, Doumar's is one of the last classic drive-in restaurants in
Virginia. Inexpensive fast-food outlets, like the Wendy's on one side of Doumar's and the
Taco Bell on the other, forced most curb service operations out of business. But Doumar's
marches on, serving those who remember real drive-ins -- or at least saw "American
Graffiti."
Just as their predecessors did in 1934, car-hops take your order and
return a few minutes later with your meal on a tray that fits onto your side window. You
can munch and sip away there, listening to your favorite radio station, doing the
crossword puzzle, spooning strained carrots into your baby's mouth and trying to keep the
dog out of the french fries.
Doumar is careful to correct a common misconception: His
"girls" never used roller skates. Some competitors did, but they had flat
parking lots. "Our girls would have rolled into the street," he says.
The Cone King is really swinging now. Batter spatters as he recharges
one of the irons, spins it so that the other side will heat, and plunges it back over the
fire. He happily shares details of the process: The wooden "shaper" molds are
turned from maple, because that wood does not impart its own taste. The griddles are
custom forged and emboss the family name onto each cone. The machine, which dates to 1905,
was first used at Coney Island and originally burned charcoal as fuel. Each batch of
"dough" is different, and you check doneness by color.
Is there a secret recipe for the batter? He chuckles. "It's in 'The
Joy of Cooking.' "
After about an hour the dough is gone and Doumar has prepared about 15
dozen cones. Later, his son and son-in-law, who now own the business, will make more.
The cones are good enough to eat by themselves, but Doumar's fills them
with ice cream produced by a dairy in Wilson, N.C. And it's good ice cream -- the butter
pecan is so satisfying that it should be illegal under Virginia law.
His morning baking completed, Doumar pulls out two albums from behind
the cone machine and shares photos: Depression-era Norfolk, his uncles at the beach
wearing rented woolen full-body bathing suits, his "girls" at work.
In a town blessed with many museums, here's one that has car-hops
instead of docents -- and where you can eat the exhibits.
Have some butter pecan. You owe it to history.
Doumar's Restaurant (20th and Monticello Ave., Norfolk; 757-627-4163) is
open Monday-Thursday, 8 a.m. to 11 p.m., and until 2:30 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays;
curb service starts at 10 a.m. In addition to ice cream cones, specialties include
barbecue sandwiches and limeade made from fresh-squeezed fruit. A jar of 24 empty cones
costs $7. Reservations unnecessary; ties not required.
© 2001 The Washington Post Company |
Company 
