I can’t think of a dessert that’s more synonymous with summer than s’mores. Homemade ice cream comes in a close second. Apple pie is good all year long, so it doesn’t really count. But just say the word “s’mores,” and images of campfires and sing-alongs pop to mind.

Seems fitting that it’s a gourmet version of the dessert pictured on the cover, doesn’t it?

Out of curiosity, I Googled the word “s’mores” and got 647,000 or so listings, mostly recipes. (Are there really people who don’t know how to make a s’more?) Some offered fancy twists, like a Charles Chocolates recipe that was posted on chow.com. It calls for a homemade marshmallow placed on a slab of fine bittersweet chocolate, “such as Scharffen Berger, E. Guittard or Valrhona,” and just one graham cracker. The whole thing is toasted open-faced in the broiler.

That one elicited a lot of feedback. Among the responses was this one from Marlie202: “We Girl Scouts of yore roasted marshmallows on a long stick over a burning fire and added a square of chocolate (we used Hershey’s) atop a graham cracker – classic.”

There are all kinds of kitchen gadgets on the market to help you make them. And I found a long entry on Wikipedia that even goes into theories about how it got its name: “‘S’more’ appears to be a contraction of the phrase ‘some more.’ … Some have jokingly surmised that the name originated from people who were so busy eating the tasty treat that they did not have time to speak in complete sentences.”

I couldn’t find anything identifying the genius behind the dessert, but its earliest mention appears to be in a 1927 Girl Scout handbook. A lot of s’mores have been eaten since then.

That’s just one taste of summer that you’ll find in this issue’s cover story. We offer a short roundup of great places for cool summer favorites, and you’ll find a more complete listing at ocmenus.com.

As for the s’more on the cover, go to The Beachcomber to get a taste of that.