Fruits, such as oranges, grapes, peaches, and tomatoes, should be served cool, but not cold or chilled. The ideal way to eat fruits is without artificial cooling. A peach is never so delicious as at the moment it is gathered from the tree, just ripe, and tomatoes have the finest flavor eaten directly off the vines; but it is seldom that these fruits or others can be so obtained, and we, knowing that fruits do not keep well except in cool places, are apt to associate a certain degree of coolness with them. The objection to serving fruits very cold is that, besides the fact that they are not as readily digested so, their delicate flavor is lost, for the cold contracts the sensitive papillæ of the tongue, and thus the power of tasting is temporarily deadened.
Oranges, peaches, and plums may be used uncooked, as they are extremely easy of digestion so, and also grapes, unless there is objection to the seeds, in which case they should be cooked, and the seeds strained out. Apples and pears are safer cooked; tomatoes may be eaten either way.
Transparent jellies are pretty served in glass dishes, and ice-cream, sherbets, and ices in china saucers, or ice-cream dishes of pink, or other delicately warm colors. Ice-cream, uncolored, in shell pink, is much more attractive than it is in cold mauve or green. Water-ices, which usually have color of their own, may be served in dishes to match it. Raspberry or strawberry ice is lovely in dull rich red; apricot ice in yellow—that is, a certain shade of écru which harmonizes with the color of the fruit—and pineapple and lemon ice in Dresden ware are very pretty.
Eggs should be opened into a hot, though not very hot, egg-glass. It is the proper thing to do so even when a patient is well enough to open them for himself, for, although the supply may have been obtained from the very best sources, there is always the risk that some of the eggs may be old, too old to be good.[45]
Oysters in the half-shell are served simply with salt, pepper, and lemon-juice, or horse-radish. A quarter or a half of a lemon is placed on the oyster-plate with the oysters, and after the salt and pepper are sprinkled on a few drops of lemon-juice are squeezed over each oyster, or a bit of horse-radish is placed on each.
Broiled oysters may be served with a sauce of melted butter, seasoned with salt, pepper, and lemon-juice or vinegar.
Toast is particularly acceptable with nearly all kinds of cooked oysters, and fancy shapes, such as tiny rounds, squares, and points, are excellent with stews, soups, and roasts, instead of crackers.
Dry toast ought to be eaten directly off the toaster, and, except in serious illness, butter may be given with it. Orange, gooseberry, raspberry, and other marmalades, currant, apple, and grape jellies, and baked sweet apples or apple-sauce, are excellent with either dry or water toast. Cooked apples in any form are delicious with milk and cream toasts.
It is the fashion just now to serve junket, slip, soft custard, lemon cream, tapioca cream, and similar delicate desserts in cups and saucers, not glasses. The quainter the pattern of the china, the prettier the effect.