Apricot wine may be made by only bruising the fruit and pouring the hot liquor over it. This wine does not require so much sweetening. To give it a curious flavour, boil an ounce of mace, and half an ounce of nutmegs, in a quart of white wine; and when the wine is fermenting, pour the liquid in hot. In about twenty days, or a month, these wines will be fit for bottling.
193. APRICOT WINE.
Boil together three pounds of sugar, and three quarts of water; and skim it well. Put in six pounds of apricots pared and stoned, and let them boil till they become tender. Then take them up, and when the liquor is cold, bottle it. After taking out the apricots, let the liquor be boiled with a sprig of flowered clary. The apricots will make marmalade, and be very good for present use.
194. LEMON WINE.
Pare off the rinds of six large lemons, cut them, and squeeze out the juice. Steep the rinds in the juice, and put to it a quart of brandy. Let it stand three days in an earthen pot close stopped; then squeeze six more, and mix with it two quarts of spring water, and as much sugar as will sweeten the whole. Boil the water, lemons, and sugar together, and let it stand till it be cool. Then add a quart of white wine, and the other lemons and brandy: mix them together, and run it through a flannel bag into some vessel. Let it stand three months and then bottle it off.
Cork the bottle well; keep it cool, and it will be fit to drink in a month or six weeks.
195. Another.
Pare five dozen of lemons very thin, put the peels into five quarts of French brandy, and let them stand fourteen days. Then make the juice into a syrup with 3 lbs. of single refined sugar, and when the peels are ready, boil 51 gallons of water, with 40 lbs. of single refined sugar for half an hour. Then put it into a tub, and when cool, add to it one spoonful of yeast, and let it work two days. Then tun it, and put in the brandy, peels, and syrup. Stir them altogether, and close up the cask. Let it stand three months, then bottle it, and it will be as pale and as fine as any citron water.
196. APPLE WHITE WINE.
Take of cold soft water, 2 gallons,
apples, well bruised, 3 bushels,
honey, 10 lbs.
white tartar, 2 ounces,
1 nutmeg, in powder,
rum, 2 quarts.