Gardening à la Mode: Fruits

Gardening à la Mode: Fruits

by Harriet Anne De Salis
Gardening à la Mode: Fruits

Gardening à la Mode: Fruits

by Harriet Anne De Salis

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Overview



This handy little guide will show you how to cook apricots and other fruits, how to keep birds and caterpillars away from your bushes, how to plant trees, and much more. Perfect for those new to cooking and gardening, this vintage manual from the 1890s abounds in easy-to-follow advice that's as solid today as it was generations ago.
Author Harriet Anne de Salis moved to the countryside from London and learned to garden by trial-and-error methods. Her firsthand experience at cultivating gardens and orchards and her commonsense housekeeping hints made her the doyenne of ladies' magazine columnists. Like its companion volume, Gardening à la Mode: Vegetables, this compact guide features alphabetized entries and an index for easy reference. Even experienced gardeners and cooks will find it a source of practical tips as well as Victorian charm.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780486814964
Publisher: Dover Publications
Publication date: 04/19/2017
Edition description: Reprint
Pages: 80
Product dimensions: 4.90(w) x 7.70(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author


London-based author Harriet Anne de Salis had a regular column in the popular Lady's Realm magazine. She also wrote several books on cooking and household management.

Read an Excerpt

Gardening à la Mode Fruits


By Harriet Anne De Salis

Dover Publications, Inc.

Copyright © 2017 Harriet Anne De Salis
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-486-81496-4


CHAPTER 1

GARDENING — FRUITS


APPLES

Apple trees delight in a sound, free, and moderately deep rich soil, of a loamy nature, as on heavy moist ground trees get into a stunted, mossy condition; and again, where it is too light or dry, especially where the subsoil is gravelly, they are apt to become badly cankered.

In planting them the soil should not only be trenched, but beneath each tree chalkstones and brickbats should be rammed in (according to the extent of the roots), to form a kind of pavement to lead the roots horizontally. The roots that are nearest the surface should be twelve inches below it.

In planting an espalier the young plant should be cut down to within a foot of the ground, and only three shoots permitted to spring from it, and should be planted at the distance of twenty feet apart, and require both winter and summer pruning.

I should advise all amateurs to engage a proficient gardener whenever pruning is necessary, as it requires knowledge and great nicety, and once the amateur has seen it done two or three times, he or she will be able to manage it afterwards; but no explanation can be given so good as a demonstrative lesson. When apple trees are old they require manuring.

Apple trees may be pinched back to three leaves each, all except the leading shoots, throughout the summer. In June the fruit should be thinned, and if the trees are young, care must be taken not to allow them to bear too heavy crops.

Canker in Apple Trees. — We have to consider, in the first instance, the cause of this disease, which may either be from frost on ill-ripened wood, injury to the roots through badly drained soil, or injury to the stems. The Ribstone Pippin, Reinette de Canada, and Bedfordshire Foundling are most prone to it. The cure can often be effected by simply paring the wounds down to perfectly healthy wood, and dressing them with a mixture of loam and fresh cow manure, worked into the consistency of paint.

Storage of Apples. — If the fruit be sound and carefully gathered, they may be packed in barrels or boxes. An apple room is a great desideratum, but it is not always convenient to have one. Each kind should be arranged each sort by itself, and the earliest arranged so that they may be taken first.

Varieties of Apples. — The varieties are endless, and it would require several pages to enumerate all the different sorts and their capabilities. Therefore I will only name some of them: — Adam's Pearmain; Alfriston, a fine old variety, good keeper, sweet and juicy, November and February; Beauty of Bath, vigorous and productive; Beauty of Kent, very juicy, crisp, tender and piquant, cooker; Bedfordshire Foundling; Bess Pool, good bearer; Beurre Clairgeau; Bismark, a new apple from Australia, large, and smelling like a Wellington; Blenheim Orange, for dessert and cooking; Boston Russet; Brandling's Seedling, large, heavy, and good keeper; Cellini Pippin; Cockpit; Cockle Pippin; Cox's Orange Pippin; Cox's Pomona, cooker; Codlin, old English; Court Pendu Plat; Domino, vigorous and productive; Duchess of Oldenburg, vigorous and productive; Dumelow's Seedling; Dutch Mignonne,a large and late variety; Emperor Alexander, large apple, good bearer, cooker, and eating; Early Harvest; Eclinville Seedling, good cooker; Emile d'Heyst; Flanders Pippin; Fletcher's Prolific; Gloria Mundi; Golden Noble, useful mid-season; Golden Reinette; Golden Pippin; Golden Russet; Gravenstein; Jolly Beggar, cooker; Juneating, red and white; King of Pippins; Keswick Codlin, cooker; Kentish Fillbasket; Lane's Prince Albert, excellent keeper and cooker, a large and handsomely striped fruit, keeps from October till March; Lord Grosvenor, good cooker; Lord Derby, cooker; Lady Henniker; Lady's Fingers; Lemon Pippin; Lord Sufifield, cooker; Malster; Mére de Minage, a large crimson apple, November, December, January; Nelson's Glory; New Hawthornden, large, excellent, and prolific; Newtown Pippin; Nonsuch, cooker; Nonpareil; Northern Greening, late apple; Peasgood Nonsuch; Pott's Seedling; Ribstone Pippin; Russet; Small's Admirable, big and productive Stirling Castle, good cooker; The Queen; The Tower of Glammis, a large solid apple, from November to February; Warner's King, good cooker, requires a warm soil, very vigorous and productive; Wellington, one of the finest winter apples; Worcester Pearmain; Winter's Peach, cooker; Yorkshire Greening.

Dessert Apples. — Beauty of Kent; Benonifine, flavour; Blenheim Orange, late; Cornish Aromatic; Cox's Orange Pippin, late; Court Pendu Plat, late; Court of Wirt, keeper; Devonshire Quarrendon, red, a warm soil; Irish Peach, small; Golden Knob; Kerry Pippin, small; King of Pippins; Lady Sudeley, striped fruit, fine flavour; Lord Burghley; Margil; Medium; Mr. Gladstone, striped and mottled; Reinette de Canada, late; Ross Nonpareil, very productive; Scarlet Nonpareil, late; Sturmer Pippin, late; Worcester Pearmain, very handsome.


RECIPES FOR COOKING

Apple Salad

Boil lightly a few apples, and then slice them into a salad bowl, adding half a pint of Syrup, the rind and juice of a lemon, one tablespoonful of whisky, and a tablespoonful of blanched and grated almonds.


Apple Timbale à la Dubois

Peel, core, and divide some apples, chop them, and put them into a stewpan with a small teaspoonful of essence of vanilla, a piece of butter, and two handfuls of sugar. Toss over a brisk fire, cooking them slowly without breaking them, then take them off the fire, and mix with them a handful of muscatel raisins and half the quantity of preserved lemon-peel cut into small dice. Whilst this is cooking have ready some short paste, and divide it into eight parts, which roll on a floured board into strings the thickness of macaroni. Butter a dome-shaped mould, then take one of the strings, and place the end of it in the centre of the mould; continue thus with the rest of the paste; then fill up the mould with the apples, which cover with a flat of the paste, and bake for fifty minutes. Turn out in a dish, and mask over it with a layer of apricot jam.


Apple Trifle

Whip up the yolks of four eggs with a little castor sugar, into which pour a pint of hot milk; then put these into a stewpan, and stir over the fire till it begins to thicken, then turn it out into a pie-dish to cool, having added a teaspoonful of brandy. Have ready a pint of apple sauce, sweetened and flavoured with lemon, into which whip the whites of the four eggs, after beating them till quite stiff. When all is well whipped pile on a glass dish, and pour the custard round, scattering ratafias over it, and then covering the whole with cream.


APRICOTS

Apricots may be grown from kernel or from budding, but it is really best to buy young trees from some known good florist. Apricot trees are trained against walls, and the time to plant is October, when they should be carefully planted on a southern or western wall in well prepared and readily manured soil. They are very free growers, requiring plenty of room, and should be planted from 12 to 15 feet apart, nailing the young branches to the wall.

If the weather be propitious, in March the branches should be unnailed, and the head of the tree cut off with a sharp knife, and cut back each shoot to about five eyes above the bud; but if the weather is severe, this pruning must be postponed a little later. In the spring, if the weather be dry, the trees must be watered by hoeing a little circle round the roots and pouring water in. When heat and drought set in, some covering should be placed round the roots to keep out the drought

All weak shoots should be cut away in the spring and summer, and all new branches nailed horizontally to the wall, and in the autumn, when the trees have done growing, the branches should be unnailed and the vigorous branches cut off to eight or nine inches long, and the weaker ones to five. When the shoots are shortened they should be nailed again as straight as possible, but great care must be used every year not to injure the spurs of the preceding year's growth, to shorten branches at the winter pruning in such a manner as to throw out fresh wood in every part of the tree, and to cut away all superfluous wood.

Frost and wasps are deadly enemies to apricots. When there are showers in the daytime and frost follows in the night, a light net should be put on for protection, but it is best to remove the net in the daytime. For the wasps some wide-mouthed bottles should be tied among the branches, filled with beer and a spoonful of gin, with a piece of paper over the mouth and a hole pierced in the centre for them to crawl in; the bottom of the paper should have preserve smeared over it. The fruit should be thinned when large enough to make tarts of. This thinning may be twice done, when the apricots should be about four to five inches apart.

A good mulching to the roots is good when the fruit is swelling, and afterwards liquid manure given at its last growth. The best kinds to grow are Moor Park, Red Muscadine, The Royal, and Museh Muscle.

The fruit of the apricot is best picked before it is quite ripe.


RECIPES

Abricots en Surprise

Cut some pound cake into little rounds with a pastry cutter, and place them on a glass dish. Halve some apricots and stew till tender; add a little sugar to the juice of the apricots, and boil till a thick syrup. Dip each of the little rounds of cake in it, and place half an apricot on each. Whip some cream, and place it around the apricot in a circle; it can easily be done with a teaspoon. This dish represents poached eggs.


Apricot Fritters

Take some apricots, cut them in halves, and dust them with sugar and a few drops of rum; then dip singly each apricot in good frying batter, and fry them in good boiling clarified dripping. Drain them, dust them liberally with castor sugar, and glaze them with a salamander.


BARBERRIES

This, if possible, should be in every garden, as being so ornamental, it can be placed in a pleasure ground. It requires very little culture and will grow in any soil and situation, and does not require pruning except to keep it within bounds. The fruit is fully ripe in October, and should be gathered in entire bunches for preserving, candying, and pickling for garnish.

Barberry trees are subject to a fungus which grows on the bark, called Pucciniæ. Syringing with lime-water is the only cure.

The best kind to grow is the common red, without stones.


RECIPES

Barberries, to Candy

Choose some fine bunches, and hang them for a quarter of an hour in a jug of boiling water; then remove them carefully, and simmer in boiling syrup made with two pounds of sugar and one pint of water; then draw the syrup from the fire, and let the bunches remain in it for some hours. Then hang them up to drain and dry, and when dry put them away carefully in boxes.


Barberries, to Pickle, for Garnishing

Gather the barberries in clusters before they are quite ripe, and cover them in strong brine, made by boiling a quarter of a pound of salt with each pint of water, adding a mite of alum. The brine must not be put on till quite cold. Put into bottles and store in a cool place.


BULLACE

These are very hardy trees, and bloom in April. They grow best in a chalky soil.

The Drap d'Or is the best variety.

The Alba, or White Bullace, is very good also.

This fruit is excellent when preserved. It is very luscious and finely flavoured. The fruit is small and round. It is generally ripe in October, but will hang longer, and the flavour is much improved if the fruit hangs till just touched by the frost.


RECIPES

Bullace Solid

Skin, core, and quarter one pound and a quarter of good boiling apples; put them in a preserving-pan with one pound of bullace juice, extracted from the fruit by placing them in a cool oven over night; then add a pound of castor sugar, and when the sugar has dissolved boil for another ten minutes; then put it into small moulds.


Compote of Bullace

Make half a pint of syrup with half a pound of loaf sugar and a quarter of a pint of water; let it boil till thick; flavour with a dessertspoonful of brandy. When the syrup is boiled and thick, drop in one by one a pint of bullaces and simmer till soft, taking care that they do not break. Remove them from the syrup, and give that a boil up again, and when cool pour over the bullaces, and whip some cream over all.


THE CRANBERRY

This is seldom grown in private gardens, as it will only grow in moist soil or peat earth. It succeeds well on the muddy margin of a pond. Johnson writes that an artificial compost may be made for it, where the soil or situation is not suitable, by mixing one-third peaty earth, one-third leaf soil, and one-third sandy loam or ordinary soil. It requires a great deal of watering. The shrubs require no other attention except being kept. Free from weeds, and a top dressing in November of rotten leaves. The American cranberry is easier to grow than the common English. The fruit is mostly used for tarts and jams and sauce.


RECIPES

Compote of Cranberries

Lay unbruised cranberries in fresh water; then drain them well, and put two pounds of the fruit and half a pound of castor sugar into a preserving'-pan, and cook slowly. Remove the berries, and boil the syrup till it s thick. Mix berries and syrup, and put into gallipots; cover with papers steeped in brandy, and tie down closely. (German recipe.)


Cranberry Sauce

This is a very good accompaniment to roast turkey. Simmer the cranberries till soft in a little champagne; then mix in liberally Devonshire cream. A little sugar may be mixed with it, but not much.


CHERRIES

Though the cherry is one of the earliest of all our hardy fruits, and flourishes freely, yet all soils do not suit it. It delights in a deep, rich, loamy soil, sandy but not clayey, a well-drained though moist soil, and some amount of shelter. Very little pruning is required until after a good head is formed in standards, but dwarf bushes and pyramids require more; they do not require manure, except as a top dressing, till they are exhausted or heavily laden with fruit.

Cherry trees require plenty of room and should be planted ten feet apart. The bush may be planted six feet apart. All varieties of cherries grow well against walls.

The best varieties are May Duke, Bigarreau, Black Heart, Kentish, best cooking, Morelia. This last is a late cherry, and, not being sweet, it does not fall a prey to birds so much; yet it is advisable to protect the trees in bearing with old fish netting.

The Morelia cherry is what is so much used in making cherry brandy.


RECIPES

Cherries à la Royal

Soak one ounce of gelatine in a little milk for an hour, then add to it a pint of raw cream, which sweeten to taste, and stir over the fire till the gelatine is quite melted; then stand it aside to cool; then flavour with a few drops of Kirschwasser, and whip till it begins to get thick. Pour a thin layer of this to the bottom of a dish, and place on ice, and have ready some stewed cherries (stoned and sweetened) and arrange them liberally on the cream directly it begins to set. Then pour the remainder of the cream over them, and as this becomes firm form some pretty design on the top with more cherries. Keep on ice till required.


Cherry Compote

Stew some cherries in a small quantity of water, a glassful of claret, a little lemon rind, a couple of cloves, and some sugar; when the cherries are soft remove them from the syrup, and boil the latter till thick.


Cherry Fritters

Stalk and stone the cherries, crack the stones, and put back the kernel into the fruit. Have ready some good frying batter, dip the cherries in this, and fry in good butter till of a nice gold colour. Drain them well, and serve sprinkled with sugar and lemon juice.


CURRANTS

It is much the wisest plan to buy young bushes, as propagating from cuttings takes longer before any fruit can be realised from them.

Black currants suit a heavy clay land, but they will flourish and bear good crops anywhere, whether the soil be light or heavy, moist or dry, and in any aspect, in the open, or against a wall or fence.

Red and white currants require a much lighter soil.

Black currants require very little pruning. If the bushes are old it is only necessary to cut away old and weak wood, replacing it with young shoots from the bottom of the bushes. The suckers from the ground want encouragement, and if very crowded, they must be thinned out.

Directly the leaves are off is the time to prune them. Leave in as much young wood as possible, and take a few of the old branches out occasionally, if they crowd the younger ones. The points of the young shoots should not be cut off, and rotted manure must be forked well in and about the roots after pruning.


(Continues...)

Excerpted from Gardening à la Mode Fruits by Harriet Anne De Salis. Copyright © 2017 Harriet Anne De Salis. Excerpted by permission of Dover Publications, Inc..
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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