Pickles should be kept in unglazed earthen jars, or wooden kegs.
Sweetmeats keep best in glass jars; unglazed stone pots answer very well
for common fruit. A paper wet in brandy, or proof spirit, and laid on
the preserved fruit, tends to keep it from fermenting. Both pickles and
sweetmeats should be watched, to see that they do not ferment,
particularly when the weather is warm. Whenever they ferment, turn off
the vinegar or syrup, scald and turn it back while hot. When pickles
grow soft, it is owing to the vinegar being too weak. To strengthen it,
heat it scalding hot, turn it back on the pickles, and when lukewarm,
put in a little alum, and a brown paper, wet in molasses. If it does not
grow sharp in the course of three weeks it is past recovery, and should
be thrown away, and fresh vinegar turned on, scalding hot, to the
pickles.
393. _Cautions relative to the use of Brass and Copper Cooking
Utensils._
Cleanliness has been aptly styled the cardinal virtue of cooks. Food is
more healthy, as well as palatable, cooked in a cleanly manner. Many
lives have been lost in consequence of carelessness in using brass,
copper, and glazed earthen cooking utensils. The two first should be
thoroughly cleansed with salt and hot vinegar before cooking in them,
and no oily or acid substance, after being cooked, should be allowed to
cool or remain in any of them.