Virginia Cookery-book

Grate the pineapple, and to one pound of it allow half a pound of sugar ; sprinkle the sugar over the pineapple, and let it stand so for a few hours ; then put it in the kettle and boil it gently for three-quarters of an hour ; or you can slice it as for the table, and, allowing three-quarters of a pound of sugar to one of fruit, simmer them together until the pineapple looks transparent. This sweetmeat is a pleasant accompaniment to vanilla ice-cream. To Preserve Oranges Whole. Take as many oranges as you wish to preserve and cut a hole in one of them large enough to enable you to scoop out the inside ; put in cold water three days to soak, changing the water each day ; then boil slowly until the bitter is extracted, changing the water every half -hour till it no longer tastes bitter. To ope pound of fruit put two pounds of sugar ; clarify the sugar by adding two beaten whites of egg after you have made a rich sirup, in the proportion of a pint of water to each two pounds of sugar, which must be white, of the best quality. When the sirup is clear drop the oranges in, and boil until transparent. They will take about four hours to boil, if the fire is well kept up. The juice may be expressed from the inside of the oranges, measured, strained, and made into a jelly that will make a beautiful addition to the orange sweetmeats, or can be put away in glasses separately. OBANas Marmalade. Take of high-flavored sour oranges half their weight in sugar ; squeeze the juice through a sieve coarse enough to allow some of the pulp to pass through as well, but none of the seeds or white inner skin ; grate in as much of the yellow rind as will flavor the marmalade richly; and if, after you have mixed the sugar with the fruit, it seems insipid, add the juice of lemon until the proper tartness is acquired. Cook for two hours, stirring all the time, and put away in glasses or small wooden boxes lined with thin white paper. QuiNCB Mabmalads. This is a most useful sweetmeat, and easily made. Take the small pieces rejected from your quince preserves, such as may be cut from inferior, half -rotten fruit, parboil them, pour off nearly all the water, mash up to a jam, and cook over a gentle fire for several hours, stirring all the while; when nearly stiff add the sugar, which must be half the weight of the fruit before it began to cook ; cook until it is almost too stiff to stir, and then pack away in cups, small moulds, little wooden boxes lined with paper, or whatever vessel you may find convenient; for it never spoils, and will keep and be good indefinitely. It can be cut into bits, for garnishing puddings, pies, etc., or cut into little squares, dipped in sugar, thus becoming a delicious confection. Gbbbn Sweetmeats. Watermelon-rind preserves, when cut into leaves, wreaths of flowers, harps — in short, all sorts of fanciful devices — look almost too good to be eaten ; and yet they are very good — strangely good — considering whence they come, and how much manipulation is needed to perfect them. The figures are traced first with a pencil, and then cut out with a sharp pen-knife, so that there is a dark green tracery of the outer rind upon a transparent, whitishgreen background. Like all the slower, more tedious processes of house - keeping, this artistic fashioning of melon-rinds has fallen into disuse ; but at least the memory of such industry and skill combined deserves mention, even where we care not to imitate. The prettiest we see now are copies from nature of various leaves ; and if a party of ingenious young people were to set themselves to work, after enjoying a fine watermelon, to present the mistress of the house with some such specimen of skill, it would not be the meanest use to which an artist has been turned. Fig Preserves.