The Closet of Sir Kenelm Digby Knight Opened Part 21

AN EXCELLENT WAY TO CRAM CHICKEN

Stone a pound of Raisins of the Sun, and beat them in a Mortar to Pulp; pour a quart of Milk upon them, and let them soak so all night. Next morning stir them well together, and put to them so much Crums of Grated stale white bread as to bring it to a soft paste, work all well together, and lay it in the trough before the Chicken (which must not be above six in a pen, and keep it very clean) and let a candle be by them all night. The delight of this meat will make them eat continually; and they will be so fat (when they are but of the bigness of a Black-bird) that they will not be able to stand, but lie down upon their bellies to eat.

TO FEED PARTRIDGES THAT YOU HAVE TAKEN WILDE

You must often change their food, giving them but of one kind at a time, that so their appet.i.tes may be fresh to the others, when they are weary of the present. Sometimes dry wheat; Sometimes wheat soaked two or three days in water, to make it soft and tender; Sometimes barley so used; Sometimes oats in like manner. Give them continually to lie by them; Some of the great green leaves of Cabbages, that grow at the bottom of the stalk, and that are thrown away, when you gather the Cabbage; which you may give them either whole or a little chopped. Give them often Ants and their Eggs, laying near them the inward mould of an Ant hill, taken up with the Ants in it.

TO MAKE PUFFS

Take new milk Curds, strained well from the whey; then rub them very well; season them with Nutmeg, Mace, Rose-water and Sugar; then take an Egg or two, a good piece of b.u.t.ter, and a handful of flower; work all together, and make them into b.a.l.l.s; bake them in an oven, upon sheets of Paper; when they are baked, serve them up with b.u.t.ter melted and beaten with Rose-water and Sugar. In stead of flower, you may take fine grated-bread, dried very well, but not Crisp.

APPLES IN GELLY

My Lady Paget makes her fine preserved Pippins, thus: They are done best, when Pippins are in their prime for quickness, which is in November. Make your Pippin-water as strong as you can of the Apples, and that it may be the less boiled, and consequently the paler, put in at first the greatest quant.i.ty of pared and quartered Apples, the water will bear. To every Pint of Pippin-water add (when you put the Sugar to it) a quarter of a pint of fair spring-water, that will bear soap (of which sort only you must use) and use half a pound of Sugar, the purest double refined. If you will have much gelly, two Pippins finely pared and whole, will be enough; you may put in more, if you will have a greater proportion of substance to the gelly.

Put at first but half the Sugar to the Liquor; for so it will be the paler.

Boil the Apples by themselves in fair water, with a very little Sugar, to make them tender; then put them into the liquor, and the rest, the other half of the Sugar with them. Boil them with a quick fire, till they be enough, and the liquor do gelly, and that you see the Apples look very clear, and as though they were transparent. You must put the juyce of two Limons and half an Orange to this in the due time. Every Pippin should be lapped over in a broad-pill of Orange; which you must prepare thus. Pare your Orange broad and very thin, and all hanging together, rub it with Salt, p.r.i.c.k it, and boil it in several waters, to take away the bitterness, and make it tender. Then preserve it by it self with sufficient quant.i.ty of Sugar. When it is throughly done, and very tender (which you must cast to do before hand, to be ready when the Apples are ready to be put up) take them out of their Syrup, and lap every Pippin in an Orange-peel, and put them into a pot or gla.s.s, and pour the liquor upon them: which will be gelly over and about the Apples, when all is cold. This proportion of liquor, Apples, and Orange-peels, will take up about three quarters of a pound of Sugar in all. If you would keep them any time, you must put in weight for weight of Sugar.

I conceive Apple-John's in stead of Pippins will do better, both for the gelly and Syrup; especially at the latter end of the year; and I like them thin sliced, rather than whole; and the Orange-peels scattered among them in little pieces or chipps.

SYRUP OF PIPPINS

Quarter and Core your Pippins; then stamp them in a Mortar, and strain out the Juyce. Let it settle, that the thick dregs may go to the bottom; then pour off the clear; and to have it more clear and pure, filter it through sucking Paper in a gla.s.s funnel. To one pound of this take one pound and an half of pure double refined Sugar, and boil it very gently (scarce simpringly, and but a very little while) till you have sc.u.mmed away all the froth and foulness (which will be but little) and that it be of the consistence of Syrup. If you put two pound of Sugar to one pound of juyce, you must boil it more & stronglier. This will keep longer, but the colour is not so fine. It is of a deeper yellow. If you put but equal parts of juyce and Sugar, you must not boil it, but set it in a _Cucurbite in bulliente Balneo_, till all the sc.u.m be taken away, and the Sugar well dissolved. This will be very pale and pleasant, but will not keep long.

You may make your Syrup with a strong decoction of Apples in water (as when you make gelly of Pippins) when they are green; but when they are old and mellow, the substance of the Apple will dissolve into pap, by boiling in water.

Take three or four spoonfuls of this Syrup in a large draught of fountain water, or small posset-Ale, _pro ardore urinae_ to cool and smoothen, two or three times a day.

GELLY OF PIPPINS OR JOHN-APPLES

Cut your Apples into quarters (either pared or unpared). Boil them in a sufficient quant.i.ty of water, till it be very strong of the Apples. Take the clear liquor, and put to it sufficient Sugar to make gelly, and the slices of Apple; so boil them all together, till the slices be enough, and the liquor gelly; or you may boil the slices, in Apple-liquor without Sugar, and make gelly of other liquor, and put the slices into it, when it is gelly, and they be sufficiently boiled. Either way, you must put at the last some juyce of Limon to it; and Amber and Musk if you will. You may do it with halves or quartered Apples, in deep gla.s.ses, with store of gelly about them. To have these clear, take the pieces out of the gelly they are boiled in, with a slice, so as you may have all the rags run from them, and then put neat clean pieces into clear gelly.

PRESERVED WARDENS

Pare and Core the Wardens, and put a little of the thin rind of a Limon into the hole that the Core leaveth. To every pound of Wardens, take half a pound of Sugar, and half a pint of water. Make a Syrup of your Sugar and Water; when it is well sc.u.mmed, put it into a Pewter dish, and your Wardens into the Syrup, and cover it with another Pewter dish; and so let this boil very gently, or rather stew, keeping it very well covered, that the steam get out as little as may be. Continue this, till the Wardens are very tender, and very red, which may be in five, or six, or seven hours. Then boil them up to the height the Syrup ought to be to keep: which yet will not be well above three or four months. The whole secret of making them red, consisteth in doing them in Pewter, which spoileth other preserves, and in any other mettal these will not be red. If you will have any Amber in them, you may to ten or twelve pounds of Wardens, put in about twenty grains of Amber, and one, or at most, two grains of Musk, ground with a little Sugar, and so put in at the last. Though the Wardens be not covered over with the Syrup in the stewing by a good deal, yet the steam, that riseth and cannot get out, but circulateth, will serve both to stew them, and to make them red and tender.

SWEET MEAT OF APPLES

My Lady Barclay makes her fine Apple-gelly with slices of John apples.

Sometimes she mingles a few Pippins with the John's to make the Gelly. But she liketh best the John's single, and the colour is paler. You first fill the gla.s.s with slices round-wise cut, and then the Gelly is poured in to fill up the vacuities. The Gelly must be boiled to a good stiffness. Then when it is ready to take from the fire, you put in some juyce of Limon, and of Orange too, if you like it: but these must not boil; yet it must stand a while upon the fire stewing in good heat, to have the juyces Incorporate and Penetrate well. You must also put in some Ambergreece, which doth exceeding well in this sweet-meat.

A FLOMERY-CAUDLE

When Flomery is made and cold, you may make a pleasant and wholesome caudle of it, by taking some lumps and spoonfuls of it, and boil it with Ale and White wine, then sweeten it to your taste with Sugar. There will remain in the Caudle some lumps of the congealed flomery, which are not ungrateful.

PLEASANT CORDIAL TABLETS, WHICH ARE VERY COMFORTING, AND STRENGTHEN NATURE MUCH

Take four ounces of blanched Almonds; of Pine kernels, and of Pistachios, _ana_, four Ounces. Erin-go-roots, Candid-Limon peels, _ana_, three Ounces, Candid Orange peels two Ounces, Candid Citron-peels four Ounces, of powder of white Amber, as much as will lie upon a s.h.i.+lling; and as much of the powder of pearl, 20 grains of Ambergreece, three grains of Musk, a book of leaf gold, Cloves and Mace, of each as much as will lie upon a three pence; cut all these as small as possible you can. Then take a pound of Sugar, and half a pint of water, boil it to a candy-height, then put in the Ambergreece and Musk, with three or four spoonfulls of Orange flower water.

Then put in all the other things and stir them well together, and cast them upon plates, and set them to dry: when both sides are dry, take Orange-flower-water and Sugar, and Ice them.

TO MAKE HARTS-HORN GELLY

Take four Ounces of Harts-horn rasped, boil it in four pound of water, till it will be a gelly, which you may try upon a plate (it will be so, in four or five or six hours gentle boiling) and then pa.s.s the clear liquor from the horn (which will be a good quart) then set it on the fire again with fine Sugar in it to your taste; when that is dissolved (or at the same time you put that in) put half a pound of white-wine or Sack into it, and a bag of Spice, containing a little Ginger, a stick of Cinnamon bruised, a Nutmeg quartered, two or three Cloves, and what other Spice you like, but Pepper.

As soon as it beginneth to boil, put into it the whites of three or four Eggs beaten, and let it boil up gently, till the Eggs harden into a curd.

Then open it with a spoon, and pour into it the juyce of three or four good Limons; then take it presently off the fire, letting it not boil more above a walm: Then run it through a Hippocras bag, putting spirit of Cinnamon, or of Ambergreece, or what you please to it.

For gelly of flesh you proceed in the same manner, with a brawny Capon or c.o.c.k, and a rouelle of Veal (first skinned, and soaked from the blood) in stead of Harts-horn: and when the broth will gelly, do as above, using a double or treble proportion of wine. Boil no Salt in it at first, for that will make the gelly black.

HARTS-HORN GELLY

Take a pound of Harts-horn, and boil it in five quarts of water, until it come to three pints, then strain it through a sieve or strainer, and so let it stand, until it be cold; and according to the strength you may take more or less of the following Ingredients. First, take your stock of gelly, & put it into a skillet or pipkin with a pound of fine loaf Sugar, and set it over a fire of Charcoal; and when it begins to boil, put in a pint or more of Rhenish-wine. Then take the whites of Eggs six or eight, beaten very well, with three or four spoonfuls of Rose-water, and put into the gelly.

Then take two grains of Amber, and one grain of Musk, and put thereto, so let it boil a quarter of an hour, but not too violent; Then put in three or four spoonfuls of Cinnamon-water, with the juyce of seven or eight Limons; boil it one walm more, and run it very hot through your gelly-bag; this done, run it again as cool and softly as you can into your Gla.s.ses and Pots.

TO MAKE HARTS-HORN GELLY

Take a pound of Harts-horn, and a prety big lean Chicken, and put it into a skillet with about nine quarts of water, and boil your stock prety stiff, so that you may cut it with a knife; you may try it in a spoon, as it is a boiling. Then drain your liquor clear away from the Harts-horn through a fine sea.r.s.e, and let it stand until the next morning; Then if there be any fat upon it, pare it away, and likewise the settlings at the bottom. Then put your Gelly into a good big skillet, and put to it a quart of the palest white-wine that you can procure, or a quart of Rhenish-wine, and one pound of double refined Sugar, and half an Ounce of Cinnamon broken into small pieces, with three or four flakes of Mace. Then set it upon the fire, and boil it a good pace. Then have the whites of sixteen Eggs beaten to a high froth; so put in the froth of your Eggs, and boil it five or six Walms; then put in the juyce of six Limons, and boil it a little while after, and then run it into a silver bason through your gelly-bag: and keep it warm by the fire, until it have run through the second time. You must observe to put but a very little into your bag at a time for the second running, that it may but little more then drop; and it will be so much the clearer: and you must not remove the whites of Eggs nor Spice out of the bag, all the while it is running. And if the weather be hot, you need not put in so much wine; for it will not then be so apt to gelly as in cold weather.

ANOTHER WAY TO MAKE HARTS-HORN-GELLY

Take a small c.o.c.k-chick, when it is scalded, slit it in two pieces, lay it to soak in warm water, until the blood be well out of it. Then take a calves foot half boiled, slit it in the middle and pick out the fat and black of it. Put these into a Gallon of fair-water; skim it very well; Then put into it one Ounce of Harts-horn, and one Ounce of Ivory. When it is half consumed, take some of it up in a spoon; and if it gelly, take it all up, and put it into a silver bason, or such a Pewter one as will endure Char-coal. Then beat four whites of Eggs, with three or four spoonfuls of Damask-Rose-water very well together. Then put these into the gelly, with a quarter of an Ounce of Cinnamon broken into very small pieces; one flake of Mace; three or four thin slices of Ginger; sweeten it with loaf Sugar to your liking; set it then over a chafing dish of coals; stir it well, and cover it close; blow under it, until there arise a sc.u.m or curd; let it boil a little, then put into it one top of Rose-mary, two or three of sweet Marjoram; wring into it the juyce of half a Limon; let not your curd fall again, for it will spoil the clearness of the gelly. If you will have it more Cordial, you may grind in a Sawcer, with a little hard Sugar, half a grain of Musk, a grain of Ambergreece. It must be boiled in an earthen pipkin, or a very sweet Iron-pot, after the Harts-horn and Ivory is in it.

It must constantly boil, until it gellieth. If there arise any sc.u.m, it must be taken off.

MARMULATE OF PIPPINS

Take the quickest Pippins, when they are newly gathered, and are sharp; Pare and Core and cut them into half quarters. Put to them their weight of the finest Sugar in Powder, or broken into little pieces. Put upon these in your preserving pan, as much fountain water, as will even cover them. Boil them with a quick-fire, till by trying a little upon a Plate, you find it gellieth. When it is cold (which may be in less then half an hour) then take it from the fire, and put into it a little of the yellow rind of Limons rasped very small, and a little of the Yellow rinde of Oranges boiled tender (casting away the first waters to correct their bitterness) and cut into narrow slices (as in the gelly of Pippins) and some Ambergreece, with a fourth part of Musk, and break the Apples with the back of your preserving spoon, whiles it cooleth. If you like them sharper, you may put in a little juyce of Limon, a little before you take the pan from the fire. When it is cold, put it into pots. This will keep a year or two.

Try if the juyce of Apples (strained out of rasped Apples) in such sort, as you make Marmulate of Quinces, with the juyce of Quinces, would not be better, then fair-water, to boil your Apples and Sugar in.

GELLY OF QUINCES

My last Gelly of Quinces I made thus. The Quinces being very ripe, and having been long gathered, I took the flesh of twelve Quinces in quarters, and the juyce of fifteen or sixteen others, which made me two pounds of juyce; And I made a strong decoction of about twenty four others, adding to these twenty four (to make the decoction the stronger, and more slimy) the Cores and the Parings of the twelve in quarters; and I used the Cores sliced and Parings of all these. All this boiled about an hour and half in eight or ten pound of water; Then I strained and pressed out the decoction (which was a little viscous, as I desired) and had between 4 and five pound of strong decoction. To the decoction and Syrup, I put three pound of pure Sugar, which being dissolved and sc.u.mmed, I put in the flesh, and in near an hour of temperate boiling (covered) and often turning the quarters, it was enough. When it was cold, it was store of firm clear red gelly, environing in great quant.i.ty the quarters, that were also very tender and well penetrated with the Sugar. I found by this making, that the juyce of Quinces is not so good to make gelly. It maketh it somewhat running like Syrup, and tasteth sweetish, mellowy, syrupy.

The Decoction of the flesh is only good for Syrup. I conceive, it would be a grateful sweetmeat to mingle a good quant.i.ty of good gelly with the Marmulate, when it is ready to put into pots. To that end they must both be making at the same time: or if one be a little sooner done then the other, they may be kept a while warm (fit to mingle) without prejudice. Though the Gelly be cold and settled, it will melt again with the warmth of the Marmulate, and so mingle with it, and make a Marmulate, that will appear very gellyish; or peradventure it may be well to fill up a pot or gla.s.s with gelly, when it is first half filled with Marmulate a little cooled.