Spons' Household Manual: A treasury of domestic receipts and a guide for home management
General
Spons' Household Manual: A treasury of domestic receipts and a guide for home management
Home economics
Cherries.--These can only be successfully preserved on the tree, and
then only when the trees are grown against walls or as espaliers.
On standards it is almost impossible to keep them from the birds,
except by much trouble and expense. Early cherries can be preserved
a month or more after they are ripe by covering the trees with mats,
and keeping them quite dark. The trees do not suffer so much by
this practice as one would imagine, although the leaves fall off
prematurely, owing no doubt to the wood being pretty well matured
before the fruit is ripe; but it is not advisable to cover the same
trees every year in succession. Morello cherries of course keep best
when grown on a north wall, and it is hardly necessary to mat them;
but they must be netted to keep off vermin.
Currants.--Take when ripe, separate from the stem, put in glass jars,
set them in a kettle of cold water, then put them over the fire, and
boil 15-20 minutes; cork tight, and set away where the frost will not
get to them.
Eggs.--(_a_) Most of the recipes given for preserving eggs direct
that the egg should be coated with something to stop up the pores.
Many seem equally efficacious if the covering is complete, with one
exception--fat, which becomes rancid, and imparts its own flavour
through the pores of the shell. Gum, the white of an egg, collodion,
or gelatine have all been used with success, but paraffin wax has
often failed. Anything that the eggs are packed in gives its own
flavour to their contents; therefore bran, chaff, and straw are to
be avoided as being likely to become musty. It is far better to set
the eggs on end, the larger ends upwards, in a wire or wooden rack,
and to allow free passage of air between. The eggs need not then be
turned, for the yolks are tethered to each end by a membranous cord,
and if they settle, it is always to one side, which would here be
impossible, nor to either extremity. One writer has used and approved
the following method: To 1 teaspoonful salicylic acid add about 1
pint boiling water. Let it cool, dip the eggs in one by one, dry
them, and store them on racks in an airy cupboard. Again some people
dip each egg into boiling water, and so make an impervious lining of
its own white; but this requires more care to prevent cracking, and
does not preserve the eggs for so long a time as the recipes given
above. Eggs are also packed in boxes in lime, and turned frequently.
The advantage of this plan is the small space that a number of eggs
occupy; its great disadvantage is that the lime acts upon the shell
and thins it down to exceeding brittleness. Much better is it to make
a tub of lime water, by pouring cold water over ordinary unslaked
lime, and when it has settled and is clear, pour off the water into
a deep vessel. Put the eggs in this and cover it over. The air is
here effectually kept away from the eggs, and the difficulty of wire
racks is avoided. For cooking purposes lime packing is all that can
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