Page:Art of Cookery 1774 edition.djvu/343

Rh , set them on a gentle fire, and let them simmer a little while, then let them boil till theder and clean, taking them off sometimes to turn and skim. Keep them under the liquor as they are doing, and with a small clean bodkin or great needle job them sometimes, that the syrup may penetrate into them. When they are enough, take them up, and put them in glasses. Boil and skim your syrup; and when it is cold, put it on your apricots. YOU must take some damsons and cut them in pieces, put them in a skillet over the fire, with as much water as will cover them. When they are boiled and the liquor pretty strong, strain it out: add for every pound of the whole damsoms wiped clean, a pound of single-refined sugar, put the third part of your sugar into the liquor, set it over the fire, and when it simmers, put in the damsons. Let them have one good boil, and take them off for half an hour covered up close; then set them on again, and let them simmer over the fire after turning them, then take them out and put them in a bason, strew all the sugar that was left on them, and pour the hot liquor over them. Cover them up, and let them stand till next day, then boil them up again till they are enough. Take them up, and put them in pots; boil the liquor till it jellies, and pour it on them when it is almost cold, so paper them up.

TAKE the best treble-refined sugar, break it into lumps, and dip it piece by piece into water, put them into a vessel of silver, and melt them over the fire; when it boils, strain it, and set it on the fire again, and let it boil till it draws in hairs, which you may perceive by holding up your spoon, then put in the flowers, and set them in cups or glasses. When it is of hard candy, break it in lumps, and lay it as high as you please. Dry it in a stove, or in the sun, and it will look like sugar-candy. TAKE the largest preserving gooseberries, and pick off the back eye, but not the stalk, then set them over the fire in a pot of water to scald, cover them very close to scald, but not boil or break, and when they are tender take them up into cold water; then take a pound and a half of double-refined sugar to a pound of gooseberries, and clarify the sugar with water, a pint to a pound of sugar, and when your syrup is cold, put the gooseberries single in your preserving-pan, put the syrup to them, and