The complete servant / Being a practical guide to the peculiar duties and business of all descriptions of servants, from the housekeeper to the servant of all-work, and from the land steward to the foot-boy. With useful receipts and tables

by servant Samuel Adams; Sarah Adams

Mortimer recommends to gather the grapes when very dry, pick them from the stalks, press them, and let the juice stand twenty-four hours in a covered vat. Afterwards to draw it off from the gross lees, then put it up in a cask, and to add a pint or quart of strong red or white port to every gallon of juice, and let the whole work, bunging it up close, and letting it stand till January; then bottling it in dry weather.

Bradley chooses to have the liquor when pressed, stand with the husks and stalks in the vat, to ferment for fifteen days.

To fine a hogshead of Claret.

Take the whites and shells of six fresh eggs, and proceed as with port finings. Claret requires to be kept warm in saw-dust when bottled.

To fine Sherry.

Take an ounce and a half of isinglass, beat it with a hammer till it can be pulled into small pieces, then put it into three pints of cider or perry, and let it remain twenty-four hours, till it becomes a jelly. After which mix it with a quart or two of wine, and whisk it well with the whites and shells of six fresh eggs. Take four or five gallons out to make room for the finings, and stir the wine well. Then nearly fill the can of finings with wine, whisk it well, and put it in the butt, stirring it well for about five minutes; afterwards fill it up, and put the bung in loose. In two days bung it up, and in eight or ten it will be fit for bottling.

To fine pale Sherry.

Put three pints of skim-milk with the whites of eight eggs, beat well together in a can; then put in finings, in the same manner as for common sherry. If the sherry be thin and poor, feed them with good brandy, as other wines.

To fine Madeira.

Take three ounces of isinglass, and dissolve it, but if old wine two ounces will be enough, also one quart of skim-milk, and half a pint of marble sand: whisk these in a can with some wine. If the pipe is full, take out a canful, and stir the pipe well; then put in the can of finings, and stir that with a staff for five minutes; after which, put the other can of wine into it, and let it have vent for three days. Then close it up, and in ten days or a fortnight it will be fine and fit for bottling and stowing with saw-dust in a warm place.