Directions for Cookery, in its Various BranchesLeslie, Eliza
General
Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches
Leslie, Eliza
Cooking, American
Take fine ripe plums, and cut them in half. Extract all the stones, and
spread out the plums on large dishes. Set the dishes on the sunny roof
of a porch or shed, and let the plums have the full benefit of the sun
for three or four days, taking them in, as soon as it is off, or if the
sky becomes cloudy. This will half dry them. Then pack them closely in
stone jars with a thick layer of the best brown sugar between every
layer of plums; putting plenty of sugar at the bottom and top of the
jars. Cover them closely, and set them away in a dry place.
If they have been properly managed, they will keep a year; and are very
good for pies and other purposes, in the winter and spring.
Peaches may be prepared for keeping in the same manner.
EGG PLUMS WHOLE.
Take large egg plums that are not quite ripe, and prick them all over
with a small silver fork. Leave on the stems. To three pounds of plums
allow three pounds and a half of loaf-sugar, broken small or powdered.
Put the plums and sugar into a preserving kettle, and pour in one half
pint of clear hard water. Hang the kettle over a moderate fire, and
boil and skim it, As soon as the skin begins to crack or shrivel, take
out the plums one at a time, (leaving the syrup on the fire,) and
spread them on large dishes to cool. Place them in the open air, and as
soon as they are cool enough to be touched with your fingers, smooth
the skin down where it is broken or ruffled, When quite cold, return
them to the syrup, (which in the mean time must have been kept slowly
simmering,) and boil the plums again till they are quite clear, but not
till they break. Put them warm into large glass or queen’s-ware jars,
and pour the syrup over them.
TO PRESERVE PEARS.
Take large fine juicy pears that are not perfectly ripe, and pare them
smoothly and thin; leaving on the stems, but cutting out the black top
at the blossom end of the fruit. As you pare them, lay them in a pan of
cold water. Make a thin syrup, allowing a quart of water to a pound of
loaf-sugar. Simmer the pears in it for about half an hour. Then pat
them into a tureen, and let them lie in the syrup for two days, There
must be syrup enough to cover them well. After two days, drain the
syrup front the pears, and add to it more sugar, in the proportion of a
pound to each pint of the thin syrup. Stir in a very little beaten
white of egg, (not more than one white to three or four pounds of
sugar,) add some fresh lemon-peel pared thin, and set the syrup over a
brisk fire. Boil it for ten minutes and skim it well. Then add
sufficient lemon-juice to flavour it; and put in the pears. Simmer them
in the strong syrup till they are quite transparent. Then take them
out, spread them to cool, and stick a clove in the blossom end of each.
Put them into glass jars; and having kept the syrup warm over the fire
while the pears were tooling, pour it over them.
If you wish to have them red, add a little powdered cochineal to the
strong syrup when you put in your pears.
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