Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine

days, shifting them once a day ; then make a pickle (but do not boil it at all) of some white-wine, some white-wine vinegar, eschalot, horse-radish, pepper, salt, cloves, and mace whole, and nutmeg quartered ; then put in your seeds and stop them close ; they are to be eaten as capers. To keep Quinces in Pickle: — Cut five or six quinces all to pieces, and put them in an earthen pot or pan, with a gallon of water and two pounds of honey ; mix all these together well, and then put them in a kettle to boil leisurely half an hour, and then strain your liquor into that earthen pot, and when ’tis cold, wipe your quinces clean, and put them into it : they must be covered very close, and they will keep all the year. To pickle Ashen -keys : — Take ashen-keys as young as you can get them, and put them in a pot with salt and water ; then take green whey, when ’tis hot, and pour over them ; let them stand till they are cold before you cover them, so let them stand ; when you use them, boil them in fair water ; when they are tender take them out, and put them in salt and water. Early Receipts. To pickle Pods of Radishes: — Gather the youngest pods, and put them in water and salt twenty-four hours ; then make a pickle for them of vinegar, cloves, mace, whole pepper : boil this, and drain the pods from the salt and water, and pour the liquor on them boiling hot : put to them a clove of garlick a little bruised. To pickle Broom-Buds : — Put your broombuds into little linnen-bags, tie them up, and make a pickle of bay-salt and water boiled, and strong enough to bear an egg ; put your bags in a pot, and when your pickle is cold, put it to them ; keep them close, and let them lie till they turn black ; then shift them two or three times, till they change green ; then take them out, and boil them as you have occasion for them : when they are boiled, put them out of the bag : in vinegar they will keep a month after they are boiled. To pickle Pur slam Stalks : — Wash your stalks, and cut them in pieces six inches long ; boil them in water and salt a dozen warms ; take them up, drain them, and when they cool, make a pickle of stale beer, white-wine Early Receipts. 145 vinegar, and salt, put them in, and cover them close. IX.— WINES. To make strong Mead: — Take of springwater what quantity you please, and make it more than blood-warm, and dissolve honey in it till ’tis strong enough to bear an egg, the breadth of a shilling ; then boil it gently near an hour, taking off the scum as it rises ; then put to about nine or ten gallons, seven or eight large blades of mace, three nutmegs quarter’d, twenty cloves, three or four sticks of cinamon, two or three roots of ginger, and a quarter of an ounce of Jamaica pepper ; put these spices into the kettle to the honey and water, a whole lemon, with a sprig of sweetbriar, and a sprig of rosemary ; tie the briar and rosemary together, and when they have boiled a little while, take them out and throw them away ; but let your liquor stand on the spice in a clean earthen pot till the next day ; then strain it into a vessel that is fit for it ; put the spice in a bag, and hang it in the Early Receipts. vessel, stop it, and at three months draw it into bottles. Be sure that ’tis fine when ’tis bottled ; after ’tis bottled six weeks ’tis fit to drmk.