[MAN DOUBLES HIS EVILS BY BROODING UPON THEM.]

2283. Athol Brose.

Put a winegla.s.sful 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. b.u.t.tered Rum.

Put a winegla.s.sful of good rum into a half-pint tumbler, with a lump or two of sugar and a piece of b.u.t.ter the size of a filbert. Fill up with _boiling_ water. This is excellent for hoa.r.s.eness 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, pa.s.s 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 quant.i.ty 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 quant.i.ty 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 gla.s.s 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 winegla.s.sful 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 quant.i.ties 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 pa.s.sing 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 Roch.e.l.le salt) two drachms, and carbonate of soda two scruples; in practice it will he found more convenient to mix the two materials in larger quant.i.ty by pa.s.sing 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_. 2291.)

2295. Economy of Tea.

A given quant.i.ty of tea is similar to malt--only imparting strength to a given quant.i.ty of water, therefore any additional quant.i.ty 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 quant.i.ty 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 quant.i.ty 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. Subst.i.tute for Cream in Tea or Coffee.

Beat the white of an egg to a froth, put to it a very small lump of b.u.t.ter, and mix well. Then stir it in gradually, so that it may not curdle. If perfectly mixed, it will be an excellent subst.i.tute for cream.

[PERSEVERANCE IS THE BRIDGE BY WHICH DIFFICULTY IS OVERCOME.]