Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches Part 33

Put the cantelopes into your jars, and pour over them the hot syrup. Cover them closely, and keep them in a dry cool place.

Large cantelopes may be prepared for preserving (after you have taken off the outer rind) by cutting them into pieces according to the natural divisions with which they are fluted. This receipt for preserving cantelopes whole, will do very well for green lemons or limes, subst.i.tuting lemon-peel and lemon-juice for that of oranges in the second syrup.

You may use some of the first syrup to boil up the pulp of the orange or lemons that has been left. It will make a sort of marmalade, that is very good for colds.

PRESERVED WATER-MELON RIND.

Having pared off the green skin, cut the rind of a water-melon into pieces of any shape you please; stars, diamonds, circles, crescents or leaves, using for the purpose a sharp penknife. Weigh the pieces, and allow to each pound a pound and a halt of loaf sugar. Set the sugar aside, and put the pieces of melon-rind into a preserving kettle, the bottom and sides of which you, have lined with green vine leaves. Put a layer of vine leaves between each, layer of melon-rind, and cover the top with leaves. Disperse among the pieces some very small bits of alum, each about the bigness of a grain of corn, and allowing one bit to every pound of the melon-rind.

Pour in just water enough to cover the whole, and place a thick double cloth (or some other covering) over the top of the kettle to keep in the steam, which will improve the greening. Let it simmer (but not boil) for two hours. Then take out the pieces of melon-rind and spread them on dishes to cool. Afterwards if you find that they taste of the alum, simmer them in very weak ginger tea for about three hours. Then proceed to make your syrup. Melt the sugar in clear spring or pump water, allowing a pint of water to a pound and a half of sugar, and mixing in with it some white of egg beaten to a stiff froth. The white of one egg will be enough for four pounds of sugar. Boil and skim it; and when the sc.u.m ceases to rise, put in the melon-rind, and let it simmer an hour. Take it out and spread it to cool on dishes return it to the syrup, and simmer it another hour. After this take it out, and put it into a tureen. Boil up the syrup again, and pour it over the melon-rind. Cover it, and let it stand all night. Next morning give the syrup another boil; adding to It some lemon-juice, allowing the juice of one lemon to a quart of the syrup. When you find it so thick as to hang in a drop on the point of the spoon, it is sufficiently done. Then put the rind into gla.s.s jars, pour in the syrup, and secure the sweetmeats closely from the air with paper dipped in brandy, and a leather outer cover.

This, if carefully done and well greened, is a very nice sweetmeat, and may be used to ornament the top of creams, jellies, jams, &c. laying it round in rings or wreaths.

Citrons may be preserved green in the same manner, first paring off the outer skin and cutting them into quarters. Also green limes.

PRESERVED PEPPERS.

For this purpose take the small round peppers while they are green. With a sharp penknife extract the seeds and cores; and then put the outsides into a kettle with vine leaves, and a little alum to give them firmness, and a.s.sist in keeping them green. Proceed precisely as directed for the water-melon rind, in the above receipt.

PUMPKIN CHIPS.

It is best to defer making this sweetmeat (which will be found very fine) till late in the season when lemons are ripe and are to be had in plenty. Pumpkins (as they keep well) can generally be procured at any time through the winter.

Take a fine pumpkin, of a rich deep colour, pare off the outer rind; remove the seeds; and having sliced the best part, cut it into chips of equal size, and about as thick as a half dollar.

They should be in long narrow pieces, two inches in breadth, and six in length. It is best to prepare the pumpkin the day before; and having weighed the chips, allow to each pound of them a pound of the best loaf-sugar. You must have several dozen of fine ripe lemons, sufficient to furnish a jill of lemon-juice to each pound of pumpkin. Having rolled them under your hand on a table, to make them yield as much juice as possible, pare off the yellow rind and put it away for some other purpose. Then having cut the lemons, squeeze out all the juice into a pitcher. Lay the pumpkin chips in a large pan or tureen, strewing the sugar among them. Then having measured the lemon-juice in a wine-gla.s.s, (two common wine-gla.s.ses making one jill,) pour it over the pumpkin and sugar, cover the vessel, and let it stand all night.

Next day transfer the pumpkin, sugar, and lemon-juice to n preserving kettle, and boil it slowly three quarters of an hour, or till the pumpkin becomes all through tender, crisp, and transparent; but it must not be over the fire long enough to break and lose its form. You must skim it thoroughly. Some very small pieces of the lemon-paring may be boiled with it. When you think it is done, take up the pumpkin chips in a perforated skimmer that the syrup may drain through the holes back into the kettle. Spread the chips to cool on large dishes, and pa.s.s the syrup through a flannel bag that has been first dipped in hot water. When the chips are cold, put them into gla.s.s jars or tumblers, pour in the syrup, and lay on the top white paper dipped in brandy. Then tie up the jars with leather, or with covers of thick white paper.

If you find that when cold the chips are not perfectly clear, crisp, and tender, give them another boil in the syrup before you put them up.

This, if well made, is a handsome and excellent sweetmeat It need not be eaten with cream, the syrup being so delicious as to require nothing to improve it. Sh.e.l.ls of puff-paste first baked empty, and then filled with, pumpkin chips, will be found very nice.

Musk-melon chips may be done in the same manner.

TO PRESERVE PINE-APPLES.

Take fine large pine-apples; pare them, and cut off a small round piece from the bottom, of each; let the freshest and best of the top leaves remain on. Have ready on a slow fire, a large preserving kettle with a thin syrup barely sufficient to cover the fruit. In making this syrup allow a pound of fine loaf-sugar to every quart of water, and half the white of a beaten egg; all to be mixed before it goes on the fire. Then boil and skim it, and when the sc.u.m ceases to rise, put in the pine-apples, and simmer them slowly an hour. Then take them out to cool, cover them carefully and pat them away till next day; saving the syrup in another vessel. Next day, put them into the same syrup, and simmer them again an hour. On the third day, repeat the process. The fourth day, make a strong fresh syrup, allowing but a pint of water to each pound of sugar, and to every three pounds the beaten white of one egg. When this syrup has boiled, and is completely skimmed, put in the pine-apples, and simmer them half an hour.

Then take them out to cool, and set them aside till next morning.

Boil them again, half an hour in the same syrup, and repeat this for seven or eight days, or till you can pierce through the pine-apple with a straw from a corn-broom. At the last of these boilings enrich the syrup by allowing to each pound of sugar a quarter of a pound more; and, having boiled and skimmed it, put in the pine apples for half an hour. Then take them out, and when quite cold put each into a separate gla.s.s jar, and fill up with the syrup.

Pine apples may be preserved in slices by a very simple process.

Pare them, and out them into round pieces near an inch thick, and take out the core from the centre of each slice. Allow a pound of loaf-sugar to every pound of the sliced pine-apple. Powder the sugar, and strew it in layers between the slices of pine-apple.

Cover it and let it set all night. Next morning measure some clear spring or pump water, allowing half a pint to each pound of sugar.

Beat some white of egg, (one white to four pounds of sugar,) and when it is a very stiff froth, stir it gradually into the water.

Then mix with it the pine-apple and sugar, and put the whole into a preserving kettle. Boil and skim it well, till the pine-apple is tender and bright all through. Then take it out, and when cold, put it up in wide-mouthed gla.s.s jars, or in large tumblers.

TO PREPARE FRESH PINE-APPLES.

Cut off the top and bottom and pare off the rind. Then cut the pine-apples in round slices half an inch thick, and put them into a deep dish, sprinkling every slice with powdered loaf-sugar.

Cover them, and let them lie in the sugar for an hour or two, before they are to be eaten.

PRESERVED LEMONS.

Take large fine ripe lemons, that have no blemishes. Choose those with thin, smooth rinds. With a sharp, knife scoop a hole in the stalk end of each, large enough to admit the handle of a tea-spoon.

This hole is to enable the syrup to penetrate the inside of the lemons. Put them into a preserving kettle with clear water, and boil them gently till you find them tender, keeping the kettle uncovered. Then take them oat, drain, and cool them, and put them into a small tub. Prepare a thin syrup of a pound of loaf-sugar to a quart of water. When you have boiled and skimmed it, pour it over the lemons and cover them. Let them stand in the syrup till next day. Then poor the syrup from the lemons, and spread them on a large dish. Boil it a quarter of an hour, and pour it over them again, having first returned them to the tub. Cover them, and let them again stand till next day, when you must again boil the syrup and pour it over them. Repeat this process every day till you find that the lemons are quite clear, and that the syrup has penetrated them thoroughly. If you find the syrup becoming too weak, add a little more sugar to it. Finally, make a strong syrup in the proportion of half a pint of water to a pound of sugar, adding a jill of raw lemon-juice squeezed from fresh lemons, and allowing to every four pounds of sugar the beaten white of an egg. Mix all well together in the kettle. Boil and skim it, and when the sc.u.m ceases to rise, pour the syrup boiling hot over the lemons; and covering them closely, let them stand undisturbed for four days.

Then look at them, and if you find that they have not sucked in enough of the syrup to make the inside very sweet, boil them gently in the syrup for a quarter of an hour. When they are cold, put them up in gla.s.s jars.

You may green lemons by burying them in a kettle of vine leaves when you give them the first boiling in the clear water.

Limes may be preserved by this receipt; also oranges.

To prepare fresh oranges for eating, peel and cut them in round slices and remove the seeds. Strew powdered loaf-sugar over them.

Cover them and let them stand an hour before they are eaten.

ORANGE MARMALADE.

Take fine large ripe oranges, with thin deep-coloured skins. Weigh them, and allow to each pound of oranges a pound of loaf-sugar.

Pare off the yellow outside of the rind from half the oranges as thin as possible; and putting it into a pan with plenty of cold water, cover it closely (placing a double cloth beneath the tin cover) to keep in the steam, and boil it slowly till it is so soft that the head of a pin will pierce it. In the mean time grate the rind from the remaining oranges, and put it aside; quarter the oranges, and take out all the pulp and the juice; removing the seeds and core. Put the sugar into a preserving kettle, with a half pint of clear water to each pound, and mix it with some beaten white of egg, allowing one white of egg, to every four pounds of sugar. When the sugar is all dissolved, put it on the fire, and boil and skim it till it is quite clear and thick. Next take the boiled parings, and cut them into very small pieces, not more than, half an inch long; put them into the sugar, and boil them in it ten minutes. Then put in the pulp and juice of the oranges, and the grated rind, (which will much improve the colour,) and boil all together for about twenty minutes, till it is a transparent ma.s.s. When cold, pot it up in gla.s.s jars, laying brandy paper on the top.

Lemon marmalade may be made in a similar manner, but you must allow a pound and a half of sugar to each pound of lemons.

ORANGE JELLY.

Take fourteen large ripe oranges, and grate the yellow rind from seven of them. Dissolve an ounce of isingla.s.s in as much warm water as will cover it. Mix the juice with a pound of loaf-sugar broken up, and add the grated, rind and the isingla.s.s. Put it into a porcelain pan over hot coals and stir it till it boils. Then, skim it well. Boil it ten minutes, and strain it (but do not squeeze it) through a jelly-bag till it is quite clear. Put it into a mould to congeal, and when you want to turn it out dip the mould into lukewarm water. Or you may put it into gla.s.ses at once.

You must have a pint of juice to a pound of sugar.

A few grains of saffron boiled with the jelly will improve the colour without affecting the taste.

PRESERVED PEACHES.

Take large juicy ripe peaches; free-stones are the best, as they have a finer flavour than the cling-stones, and are much more manageable both to preserve, and to eat. Pare them, and cut them in half, or in quarters, leaving out the stones, the half of which you must save. To every pound of the peaches allow a pound of loaf-sugar. Powder the sugar, and strew it among your peaches.

Cover them and let them stand all night. Crack half the peach-stones, break them up, put them into a small sauce-pan and boil them slowly in as much water as will cover them. Then when the water is well flavoured with the peach-kernels, strain them out, and set the water aside. Take care not to use too much of the kernel-water; a very little will suffice. Put the peaches into a preserving kettle, and boil them in their juice over a quick fire; (adding the kernel-water,) and skimming them all the time. When they are quite clear, which should be in half an hour, take them off, and put them into a tureen. Boil the syrup five minutes longer, and pour it hot over the peaches. When they are cool, put them into gla.s.s jars, and tie them up with paper dipped in brandy laid next to them.

Apricots, nectarines, and large plums maybe preserved in the same manner.

PEACHES FOR COMMON USE.

Take ripe free-stone peaches; pare, stone, and quarter them. To six pounds of the cut peaches allow three pounds of the best brown sugar. Strew the sugar among the peaches, and set them away. Next morning add a handful of peach leaves, put the whole into a preserving kettle, and boil it slowly about an hour and three quarters, or two hours, skimming it well. When cold, put it up in jars and keep it for pies, or for any common purpose.