This can only be made when fresh green mint is in season.
Lay at the bottom of a large tumbler, one or two round slices of pine-apple nicely pared; and cover them with a thick layer of loaf-sugar, powdered or well-broken. Pour on it a glass or more of the best brandy. Add cold water till the tumbler is two-thirds full. Finish with a thick layer of pounded ice till it nearly reaches the top. Then stick down to one side a bunch of fresh green mint, the sprigs full and handsome, and tall enough to rise above the edge of the tumbler. Place, in the other side, one of the small tubes or straws used for drawing in this liquid.
The proportions of the above ingredients may, of course, be varied according to taste.
A UNION PUDDING.—
The night before you make this pudding, take a piece of rennet, in size rather more than two inches square, and carefully wash off in two cold waters all the salt from the outside. Then wipe it dry. Put the rennet into a tea-cup and pour on sufficient milk-warm water to cover it well. Next morning, as early as you can, stir the rennet-water into a quart of rich milk. Cover the milk, and set it in a warm place till it forms a firm curd, and the whey becomes thin and greenish. Then remove it to a cold place and set it on ice. Blanch, in scalding water, two ounces of shelled bitter almonds, or peach-kernels; and two ounces of shelled sweet almonds. Pound the almonds in a mortar, to a smooth paste, one at a time (sweet and bitter alternately, so as to mix them well); and add, while pounding, sufficient rose-water to make them light and white, and to prevent their oiling. Grate upon a lump of loaf-sugar the yellow rind or zest of two lemons, scraping off the lemon-zest as you proceed, and transferring it to a saucer. Squeeze over it the juice of the lemons, and mix the juice and the zest with half a pound and two ounces of finely-powdered loaf-sugar, adding a small nutmeg, grated. Then put the cold curd into a sieve, and drain it from the whey till it is left very dry, chopping the curd small, that it may drain the better. Beat in a shallow pan the yolks of eight eggs till very light, thick, and smooth. Then mix into the egg the curd, in turn with the pounded almonds, and the sugar and lemon. Finish with a glass of brandy, or of Madeira or Sherry, and stir the whole very hard.
Butter a deep dish of strong white ware. Put in the mixture: set it immediately into a brisk oven and bake it well. When done, set it in a cold place till wanted, and before it goes to table, sift powdered sugar over it. It will be still better to cover the surface with a meringue or icing, highly flavored with rose-water or lemon-juice. You may decorate the centre with the word UNION in letters of gilt sugar.
The pudding will be found very fine.
COCOA-NUT CANDY.—
Take three cocoa-nuts and grate their meat on a coarse grater. Weigh the grated cocoa-nut, and to each pound, allow one pound of the best double-refined loaf-sugar. Put the sugar into a preserving kettle, and to every two pounds allow a pint of water, and the beaten white of one egg mixed into the water. When the sugar is entirely dissolved in the water, set it over the fire, and boil and skim it. When the scum has ceased to rise, and the sugar is boiling hard, begin to throw in the grated cocoa-nut, gradually, stirring hard all the time. Proceed till the mixture is so thick it can be stirred no longer. Have ready, square or oblong tin pans, slightly buttered with the best fresh butter. Fill them with the mixture, put in evenly and smoothly, and of the same thickness all through the pan. Smooth the surface all over with a broad knife dipped in cold water. Set it to cool, and, when the candy is almost hard, score it down in perpendicularly straight lines with a sharp knife dipped in cold water, the lines being two or three inches apart. These cuts must be made deep down to the bottom of the pan. When it is quite cold and firm, cut the candy entirely apart, so as to form long sticks, and keep it in a cold place.
If any of the grated cocoa-nut is left, you may make it into cocoa-nut maccaroons, or into a cocoa-nut pudding.