"It may also be a circumstance worth remarking, that although the sugar thus obtained is very good for common use, it by no means answers the purpose of the confectioner, as it is not fit for preserving; and for this purpose the cane sugar alone is used; so that although great merit may attach to the industry of a person who in times of scarcity can produce such an useful article as sugar from a vegetable so easily grown, yet when cane sugar can be imported at a moderate rate, it will always supersede the use of the other."
56. PYRUS malus. THE APPLE.—This useful fruit, now growing so much to decay in this country, which was once so celebrated for its produce, is grown in great perfection in all the northern provinces of France; and she supplied the London markets with apples this season, for which she was paid upwards of 50,000 l.; and can most likely offer us good cyder on moderate terms.
The French people, ever alive to improvement and invention, having discovered a mode of extracting sugar in considerable quantity from this fruit, I shall transcribe the particulars of it.
On the Preparation of Liquid Sugar from Apples or Pears. By M. DUBUC. (Ann. de Chim. vol. lxviii.)—"Several establishments have been made in the South of France for making sugar from grapes; it is therefore desired to communicate the same advantage to the North of France, as apples and pears will produce sugar whose taste is equally agreeable as that of grapes, and equally cheap.
"Eight quarts of the full ripe juice of the Orange Apples was boiled for a quarter of an hour, and forty grammes of powdered chalk added to it, and the boiling continued for ten minutes longer. The liquor was strained twice through flannel, and afterwards reduced by boiling to one half of its former bulk, and the operation finished by a slow heat until a thick pellicle rose on the surface, and a quart of the syrup weighed two pounds. By this method two pounds one ounce of liquid sugar was obtained, very agreeable in flavour, and which sweetened water very well, and even milk, without curdling it.
"Eight quarts of the juice of apples called Doux levesque, yielded by the same process two pounds twelve ounces of liquid sugar.
"Eight quarts of the juice of the sour apples called Blanc mollet, yielded two pounds ten ounces of good sugar.
"Eight quarts of the juice of the watery apples called Girard, yielded two pounds and a half.
"Twenty-five chilogrammes, or fifty-pounds of the above four apples, yielded nearly fourty-two pounds of juice; which took three ounces of chalk and the white of six eggs, and produced more than six pounds of excellent liquid sugar.
"In order to do without the white of eggs, twenty pounds of the juice of the above apples were saturated with eleven drachms of chalk, and repeatedly strained through flannel, but it was still thick and disagreeable to the taste; twelve drachms of charcoal powder were then added, and the whole boiled for about ten minutes, and then strained through flannel; it was then clear, but higher-coloured than usual; however, it produced very good sugar. Six quarts of apple-juice were also treated with seven drachms of chalk, and one ounce of baker's small-coal previously washed until it no longer coloured the water, with the same effect.