Green Tomato Preserves. (Good.)

8 lbs. small green tomatoes. Pierce each with a fork.

7 lbs. sugar.

4 lemons - the juice only.

1 oz. ginger and mace mixed.

Heat all together slowly, and boil until the fruit is clear* Take it from the kettle in a perforated skimmer, and spread upon dishes to cool. Boil the syrup thick. Put the fruit into jars and cover with hot syrup.

Preserved Figs+

The weight of ripe figs in sugar. Peel of one lemon and juice of two. A little ginger.

Cover the figs with cold water for twelve hours. Then simmer in water enough to cover them until tender, and spread out upon a sieve to cool and harden. Make a syrup of the sugar, and a cup of cold water for every pound. Boil until clear of scum; put in the figs and simmer ten minutes. Take them out and spread upon dishes in the sun. Add the lemons and ginger; boil the syrup thick; give the figs another boil of fifteen minutes, and fill the jars three-quarters of the way to the top. Fill up with boiling syrup, cover, and, when cold, seal up.

Baked Apples+

Cut out the blossom end of sweet apples - Campfields or Pound Sweets - with a sharp penknife; wash, but do not pare them; pack them in a large pudding-dish; pour a cupful of water in the bottom, cover closely with another dish or pan; set in a moderate oven, and steam until tender all through. Pour the liquor over them while hot, 20 and repeat this as they cool. Set on the ice several hours before tea, and, when you are ready, transfer them to a glass dish, pouring the juice over them again. Eat with powdered sugar and cream. Apples baked in this way are more tender and digestible, and better flavored, than those baked in an open vessel. Campfields are particularly good.

Apples Stewed Whole+

Pare, and with a small knife extract the cores of fine juicy apples that are not too tart; put into a deep dish with just enough water to cover them; cover and bake, or stew, in a moderate oven, until they are tender and clear; take out the apples, put in a bowl, and cover to keep hot; put the juice into a saucepan, with a cupful of sugar for twelve apples, and boil half an hour. Season with mace, ginger, or whole cloves, adding the spice ten minutes before you remove the syrup from the fire. Pour scalding over the apples, and cover until cold.

Eat with cream.

Baked Pears

Sweet pears may be baked just as sweet apples are - i.e., steamed without being pared or cored.

Or,

If large, cut in half, put into a deep dish, with a very little water; sprinkle them with sugar, and put a few cloves, or bits of cinnamon, or a pinch of ginger among them. Cover closely, and bake until tender.

Stewed Pears+

If small and ripe, cut out the blossom-end, without paring or coring; put into a saucepan, with enough water to cover them, and stew until tender; add a half cupful of sugar for every quart of pears, and stew all together ten minutes; take out the pears, lay in a covered bowl to keep warm; add to the syrup a little ginger or a few cloves, boil fifteen minutes longer, and pour over the fruit hot.

Or,

If the pears are not quite ripe, but hard and disposed to be tough, peel them, cut out the blossom-end, leaving on the stems, and stew until tender in enough water to cover them. Take them out, set by in a covered dish to keep warm; add to the liquor in the saucepan an equal quantity of the best molasses and a little ginger; boil half an hour, skim, and return the pears to the saucepan. Stew all together twenty minutes, and pour out.

These are very good, and will keep a week or more, even in warm weather. I have canned them while boiling hot, and kept them sweet a whole year.