hot
iron.
A Gambler and a Swindler are Near Neighbours.
2255. To Renovate Silks (1)
Sponge faded silks with warm water and soap, then rub them with a dry
cloth on a flat board; afterwards iron them on the
inside
with a
smoothing iron. Old black silks may be improved by sponging with
spirits; in this case, the ironing may be done on the right side, thin
paper being spread over to prevent glazing.
2256. Black Silk Reviver (2)
Boil logwood in water for half an hour; then simmer the silk half an
hour; take it out, and put into the dye a little blue vitriol, or
green copperas; cool it, and simmer the silk for half an hour. Or,
boil a handful of fig-leaves in two quarts of water until it is
reduced to one pint; squeeze the leaves, and bottle the liquor for
use. When wanted, sponge the silk with this preparation.
2257. Restoring Colour to Silk (3)
When the colour has been taken from silk by acids, it may be restored
by applying to the spot a little hart's-horn, or sal volatile.
2258. To Remove Water Stains from Black Crape
When a drop of water falls on a black crape veil or collar, it leaves
a conspicuous white mark. To obliterate this, spread the crape on a
table (laying on it a large book or a paper-weight to keep it steady),
and place underneath the stain a piece of old black silk. With a large
camel's-hair brush dipped in common ink go over the stain, and then
wipe off the ink with a small piece of old soft silk. It will dry at
once, and the white mark will be seen no more.
2259. To Remove Stains from Mourning Dresses
Boil a handful of fig-leaves in two quarts of water until reduced to a
pint. Bombazines, crape, cloth, &c., need only be rubbed with a
sponge dipped in this liquor, and the stains will be instantly removed.
2260. Wax
Wax may be taken out of cloth by holding a red-hot iron within an inch
or two of the marks, and afterwards rubbing them with a soft clean rag.
2261. Grease Spots from Silk
Upon a deal table lay a piece of woollen cloth or baize, upon which
lay smoothly the part stained, with the right side downwards. Having
spread a piece of brown paper on the top, apply a flat iron just hot
enough to scorch the paper. About five or eight seconds is usually
sufficient. Then rub the stained part briskly with a piece of
whity-brown paper.
2262. Liquid for Preserving Furs from Moth
Warm water, one pint; corrosive sublimate, twelve grains. If washed
with this, and afterwards dried, furs are safe from moth. Care should
be taken to label the liquid—
Poison
.
One Doubt may Lead to Disbelief.
2263. Velvet
When Velvet gets crushed from pressure, hold the parts over a basin of
hot
water, with the lining of the article next the water; the pile
will soon rise, and assume its original beauty.
2264. Stockings
Worsted and Lambs'-Wool stockings should never be mended with worsted
or lambs'-wool, because, the latter being new, it shrinks more than
the stockings, and draws them up till the toes become short and
narrow, and the heels have no shape left.
2265. Making Flannels
All Flannels should be soaked before they are made up, first in cold,
then in hot water, in order to shrink them.
2266. Washing Flannel
Flannel should always he washed with white soap, and in warm but not
boiling water.
2267. Brewing
The best time of the year for brewing is the autumn. The spring is
also suitable, but less so. It is a great object to secure a moderate
temperature for the cooling of the worts, and to insure gradual
fermentation. To those who wish to enter upon the practice, without
any previous knowledge, we would advise their calling in the aid of
some one practically acquainted with the process for the first
operation. By so doing they will save a great deal of trouble,
disappointment, and expense. In all places, town or country, there
are persons who have worked in brewing establishments, or in
gentlemen's families where they have superintended the operations of
the brew-house, and the aid of such persons would be valuable. With
such assistance, the following receipts will be of importance, since
many who are able to go through the manipulations of brewing are
unaware of the proper proportions to employ:
2268. Ale
Take three bushels of malt, three pounds of hops, fifty-two gallons of
water, for two workings. Or,—malt, two bushels and a half; sugar,
three pounds; hops, three pounds; coriander seeds, one ounce;
capsicum, a drachm. Thirty-six gallons. This gives a pleasant ale,
with a good body.
2269. Amber Ale
Three bushels of amber malt, three quarters of a bushel of pale amber
malt, two pounds of hops, a tablespoonful of salt. Three mashes, forty
to fifty gallons. Skim, and fine with isinglass.
2270. Burton Ale
One quarter of pale malt, eight pounds and a half pale hops; mash
three times. Work the first mash at 170°, second at 176°, third at
150°. Boil the first wort by itself; when boiling add three pounds of
honey, a pound and a half of coriander seeds, one ounce of salt. Mix
the worts when boiled, cool to 61°, set to work with a pint and a half
of yeast. As soon as the liquor gets yeasty, skim the head half off;
rouse the rest with another pint and a half of yeast, three quarters
of an ounce of bay salt, and a quarter of a pound of malt or bean
flour. This makes a hogshead.
2271. Edinburgh Ale
Mash two barrels per quarter, at 183°; mash for three quarters of an
hour; let it stand one hour, and allow half an hour to run off. Or,
mash one barrel per quarter, at 190°; mash three quarters of an hour,
let it stand three quarters of an hour, and tap.
2272. Porter
Brown amber and pale malt, in equal quantities; turn them into the
mash-tub. Turn on the first liquor at 165°; mash one hour, then coat
the whole with dry malt. In one hour set the tap. Mix ten pounds of
brown hops to a quarter of malt, half old, half new; boil the first
wort briskly with the hops for three quarters of an hour, after
putting into the copper one pound and a half of sugar, and one pound
and a half of extract of liquorice to the barrel, turn it into
coolers, rousing the wort the while. Turn on the second liquor at
174°, set tap again in an hour. The second wort having run off, turn
on again at 145°; mash an hour, and stand an hour; boil the second
wort with the same hops for one hour. Turn into the coolers, and let
into the tub at 64°, mixing the yeast as it comes down. Cleanse the
second day at 80°, previously adding a mixture of flour and salt, and
rousing well.
When in Motion, to Push on is Easy.
2273. Making Wines
Wines from Rhubarb, Unripe Grapes, Currants, Gooseberries, &c.—The
whole art of wine-making consists in the proper management of the
fermenting process; the same quantity of fruit, whether it be rhubarb,
currants, gooseberries, unripe grapes, leaves, tops, and tendrils,
water, and sugar, will produce two different kinds of wine, by varying
the process of fermentation only—that is, a dry wine like sherry, or
a brisk beverage like champagne; but neither rhubarb, currants, nor
gooseberries will produce a wine with the true champagne flavour; it
is to be obtained only from the fruit of the grape, ripe or unripe,
its leaves, tops, and tendrils. The following receipt will do for
rhubarb, or any of the above-mentioned fruits.
2274. English Champagne
Take fifty pounds of rhubarb and thirty-seven pounds of fine moist
sugar. Provide a tub that will hold from fifteen to twenty gallons,
taking care that it has a hole for a tap near the bottom. In this tub
bruise the rhubarb; when done, add four gallons of water; let the
whole be well stirred together; cover the tub with a cloth or blanket,
and let the materials stand for twenty-four hours; then draw off the
liquor through the tap; add one or two more gallons of water to the
pulp, let it be well stirred, and then allowed to remain an hour or
two to settle, then draw off; mix the two liquors together, and in it
dissolve the sugar.
Let the tub be made clean, and return the liquor to it, cover it with
a blanket, and place it in a room the temperature of which is not
below 60° Fahr.; here it is to remain for twenty-four, forty-eight, or
more hours, until there is an appearance of fermentation having begun,
when it should be drawn off into the ten-gallon cask, as fine as
possible, which cask must be filled up to the bung-hole with water, if
there is not liquor enough; let it lean to one side a little, that it
may discharge itself; if there is any liquor left in the tub not quite
fine, pass it through flannel, and fill up with that instead of water.
As the fermentation proceeds and the liquor diminishes, it must be
filled up daily, to encourage the fermentation, for ten or twelve
days; it then becomes more moderate, when the bung should be put in,
and a gimlet hole made at the side of it, fitted with a spile; this
spile should be taken out every two or three days, according to the
state of the fermentation, for eight or ten days, to allow some of the
carbonic acid gas to escape. When this state is passed, the cask may
he kept full by pouring a little liquor in at the vent-hole once a
week or ten days, for three or four weeks.
This operation is performed at long intervals, of a month or more,
till the end of December, when on a fine frosty day it should be drawn
off from the lees as fine as possible; and the turbid part passed
through flannel. Make the cask clean, return the liquor to it, with
one drachm of isinglass (pure) dissolved in a little water; stir the
whole together, and put the bung in firmly.
Choose a clear dry day in March for bottling. The bottles should be
champagne bottles—common wine bottles are not strong enough; secure
the corks in a proper manner with wire, &c. The liquor is generally
made up to two or three pints over the ten gallons, which is bottled
for the purpose of filling the cask as it is wanted. The wine contains
spirit enough without the addition of brandy, which spoils all wines;
a proper fermentation producing spirit enough.
The way to obtain a dry wine from these materials is to keep the cask
constantly filled up to the bung-hole, daily or every other day, as
long as any fermentation is perceptible by applying the ear near to
the hole; the bung may then be put in lightly for a time, before
finally fixing it; it may be racked off on a fine day in December, and
fined with isinglass as above directed, and bottled in March.
A Word Before is Worth Two Behind.
2275. Parsnip Wine
Take fifteen pounds of sliced parsnips, and boil until quite soft in
five gallons of water; squeeze the liquor well out of them, run it
through a sieve, and add three pounds of coarse lump sugar to every
gallon of liquor. Boil the whole for three quarters of an hour. When
it is nearly cold, add a little yeast on toast. Let it remain in a tub
for ten days, stirring it from the bottom every day; then put it into
a cask, in which it should remain for a year. As it works over, fill
it up every day.
2276. Turnip Wine
Take a large number of turnips, pare and slice them; then place in a
cider-press, and obtain all the juice you can. To every gallon of
juice add three pounds of lump sugar, and half a pint of brandy, Pour
the liquor into a cask, and when it has done working, bung it close
for three months, and draw off into another cask. When it is fine,
bottle, and cork well.
2277. Blackberry Wine
Gather the fruit when ripe, on a dry day. Put into a vessel, with the
head out, and a tap fitted near the bottom; pour on boiling water to
cover it. Mash the berries with your hands, and let them stand covered
till the pulp rises to the top and forms a crust, in three or four
days. Then draw off the fluid into another vessel, and to every
gallon add one pound of sugar; mix well, and put it into a cask, to
work for a week or ten days, and throw off any remaining lees, keeping
the cask well filled, particularly at the commencement. When the
working has ceased, bung it down; after six to twelve months it may be
bottled.
2278. Black or White Elderberry Wine
Gather the berries ripe and dry, pick them, bruise them with your
hands, and strain them. Set the liquor by in glazed earthen vessels
for twelve hours, to settle; put to every pint of juice a pint and a
half of water, and to every gallon of this liquor three pounds of good
moist sugar; set in a kettle over the fire, and when it is ready to
boil, clarify it with the white of four or five eggs; let it boil one
hour, and when it is almost cold work it with strong ale yeast, and
tun it, filling up the vessel from time to time with the same liquor,
saved on purpose, as it sinks by working. In a month's time, if the
vessel holds about eight gallons, it will be fine and fit to bottle,
and after bottling, will be fit to drink in twelve months.
2279. Arrack (Imitation)
Dissolve two scruples of flowers of benjamin in a quart of good rum,
and it will impart to the spirit the fragrance of arrack.
2280. Devonshire Junket
Put warm milk into a bowl, turn it with a little rennet, then add some
scalded cream, sugar, and cinnamon on the top, without breaking the
curd.
2281. A Nightcap For Travellers
Take your pocket handkerchief, and laying it out the full square,
double down
one-third
over the other part. Then raise the whole and
turn it over, so that the third folded down shall now be underneath.
Take hold of one of the folded corners, and draw its point towards the
centre; then do the same with the other, as in making a cocked-hat, or
a boat, of paper. Then take hold of the two remaining corners, and
twisting the hem of the handkerchief, continue to roll it until it
meets the double corners brought to the centre, and catches them up a
little. Lift the whole, and you will see the form of a cap, which,
when applied to the head, will cover the head and ears, and, being
tied under the chin, will not come off. Very little practice will
enable you to regulate the size of the folds so as to fit the head.
2282. Scotch Punch, or Whisky Toddy
Pour about a wineglassful of
boiling
water into a half-pint tumbler,
and sweeten according to taste. Stir well up, then put in a
wineglassful of whisky, and add a wineglassful and a half more boiling
water.
Be sure the water is boiling
. Never put lemon into toddy.
The two in combination, in almost every instance, produce acidity in
the stomach. If possible, store your whisky
in the wood
, not in
bottles as keeping it in the cask mellows it, and dissipates the
coarser particles.
Man Doubles his Evils by Brooding upon them.
2283. Athol Brose
Put a wineglassful of whisky into a half-pint tumbler; sweeten with a
large teaspoonful of honey, and fill up with milk that has been
nearly
brought to boiling over a clear fire. Remember that "milk
boiled is milk spoiled."
2284. Buttered Rum
Put a wineglassful of good rum into a half-pint tumbler, with a lump
or two of sugar and a piece of butter the size of a filbert. Fill up
with
boiling
water. This is excellent for hoarseness and husky
condition of the throat.
2285. Raspberry Vinegar
Put a pound of very fine ripe raspberries in a bowl,
bruise them
well
, and pour upon them a quart of the best white wine vinegar; next
day strain the liquor on a pound of fresh ripe raspberries; bruise
them
also, and the following day do the same,
but do not squeeze
the fruit, or it will make it ferment
; only drain the liquor as dry
as you can from it. Finally, pass it through a canvas bag, previously
wet with the vinegar, to prevent waste. Put the juice into a stone
jar, with a
pound of sugar
, broken into lumps, to
every pint of
juice
; stir, and when melted, put the jar into a pan of water; let it
simmer, and skim it; let it cool, then bottle it; when cold it will be
fine, and thick, like strained honey, newly prepared.
2286. Ginger Beer
The following receipt is taken from the celebrated treatise of Dr.
Pereira on Diet. The honey gives the beverage a peculiar softness, and
from not being fermented with yeast, it is less violent in its action
when opened, but requires to be kept a somewhat longer time before
use. White sugar, five pounds; lemon juice, one quarter of a pint;
honey, one quarter of a pound; ginger, bruised, five ounces; water,
four gallons and a half. Boil the ginger in three quarts of the water
for half an hour, then add the sugar, lemon juice and honey, with the
remainder of the water, and strain through a cloth; when cold add a
quarter of the white of an egg, and a small teaspoonful of essence of
lemon; let the whole stand four days, and bottle; it will keep for
many months. This quantity will make 100 bottles.
2287. Ginger-beer Powders
Blue paper
; Carbonate of soda, thirty grains; powdered ginger, five
grains; ground white sugar, one drachm to one drachm and a half;
essence of lemon, one drop. Add the essence to the sugar, then the
other ingredients. A quantity should be mixed and divided, as
recommended for Seidlitz powders.—
White paper
; Tartaric acid,
thirty grains.
Directions
.—Dissolve the contents of the blue paper
in water; stir in the contents of the white paper, and drink during
effervescence. Ginger-beer powders do not meet with such general
acceptation as lemon and kali, the powdered ginger rendering the
liquid slightly turbid.
2288. Lemonade
Powdered sugar, four pounds; citric or tartaric acid, one ounce;
essence of lemon, two drachms; mix well. Two or three teaspoonfuls
make a very sweet and agreeable glass of extemporaneous lemonade.
2289. Milk Lemonade
Dissolve three quarters of a pound of loaf sugar in one pint of
boiling water, and mix with them one gill of lemon juice, and one gill
of sherry, then add three gills of cold milk. Stir the whole well
together, and strain it.
2290. Champagne Lemonade
Champagne Lemonade, composed of two bottles of champagne, one bottle
of seltzer water, three pomegranates, three lemons, and of sugar
sufficient, is a
princely beverage
in hot weather; only care must be
taken that perspiration is not hereby too much encouraged.
2291. Summer Champagne
To four parts of seltzer water add one of Moselle wine (or hock), and
put a teaspoonful of powdered sugar into a wineglassful of this
mixture; an effervescence takes place, and the result is a sort of
champagne, which is more wholesome in hot weather than the genuine
wine known by that name.
Think of Ease but Work on.
2292. Lemon and Kali, or Sherbet
Large quantities of this wholesome and refreshing preparation are
manufactured and consumed every summer; it is sold in bottles, and
also as a beverage, made by dissolving a large teaspoonful in a
tumbler two-thirds filled with water. The ingredients are—ground
white sugar, half a pound; tartaric acid and carbonate of soda, of
each a quarter of a pound; essence of lemon, forty drops. All the
powders should be well dried; add the essence to the sugar, then the
other powders; stir all together, and mix by passing twice through a
hair sieve. Must be kept in tightly-corked bottles, into which a damp
spoon must not be inserted. The sugar must be ground, or very finely
pulverized, in a pestle and mortar. The powdered sugar sold for icing
cakes will do.
2293. Soda Water Powders
One pound of carbonate of soda, and thirteen and a half ounces of
tartaric acid, supply the materials for 256 powders of each sort. Put
into blue papers thirty grains of carbonate of soda, and into white
papers twenty-five grains of tartaric acid.
Directions
.—Dissolve the contents of the blue paper in half a
tumbler of water, stir in the other powder, and drink during
effervescence. Soda powders furnish a saline beverage which is very
slightly laxative, and well calculated to allay the thirst in hot
weather.
2294. Seidlitz Powders
Seidlitz powders are usually put up in two papers. The larger blue
paper contains tartarized soda (also called Rochelle salt) two
drachms, and carbonate of soda two scruples; in practice it will he
found more convenient to mix the two materials in larger quantity by
passing them twice through a sieve, and then divide the mixture either
by weight or measure, than to make each powder separately. One pound
of tartarized soda, and five ounces and a half of carbonate of soda,
will make sixty powders. The smaller powder, usually placed in white
paper, consists of tartaric acid, half a drachm.
Directions for Use
.—Dissolve the contents of blue paper in half a
tumbler of cold water, stir in the other powder, and drink during
effervescence. (
See par
.
.)
2295. Economy of Tea
A given quantity of tea is similar to malt—only imparting strength to
a given quantity of water, therefore any additional quantity is waste.
Two small teaspoonfuls of good black tea and one three parts full of
green, is sufficient to make three teacupfuls agreeable, the water
being put in, in a boiling state, at once; a second addition of water
gives a vapid flavour to tea.
2296. Preparing Tea
In preparing tea a good economist will be careful to have the best
water, that is, the softest and least impregnated with foreign
mixture; for if tea be infused in hard and in soft water, the latter
will always yield the greatest quantity of the tannin matter, and will
strike the deepest black with sulphate of iron in solution.
2297. Tea-making
Dr. Kitchiner recommends that all the water necessary should be poured
in at once, as the second drawing is bad. When much tea is wanted, it
is better to have two tea-pots instead of two drawings.
2298. Another Method
The water should be fresh boiled, not exhausted by long boiling. Scald
the teapot and empty it; then put in as much water as necessary for
the first cups; put the tea on it as in brewing, and close the lid as
quickly as possible. Let it stand three minutes and a half, or, if the
quantity be large, four minutes, then fill the cups. This is greatly
superior to the ordinary method, the aroma being preserved instead of
escaping with the steam, as it does when the water is poured on the
tea.
2299. Substitute for Cream in Tea or Coffee
Beat the white of an egg to a froth, put to it a very small lump of
butter, and mix well. Then stir it in gradually, so that it may not
curdle. If perfectly mixed, it will be an excellent substitute for
cream.
Perseverance is the Bridge by which Difficulty is Overcome.