Colouring for confectionary
Red
Take twenty grains of cochineal, and fifteen grains of cream of tartar finely powdered; add to them a piece of alum the size of a cherry stone, and boil them with a jill of soft water, in an earthen vessel, slowly, for half an hour. Then strain it through muslin, and keep it tightly-corked in a phial.
COCHINEAL FOR PRESENT USE.
Take two cents’ worth of cochineal. Lay it on a flat plate, and bruise it with the blade of a knife. Put it into half a tea-cup of white brandy. Let it stand a quarter of an hour, and then filter it through fine muslin.
YELLOW COLOURING.
Take a little saffron, put it into an earthen vessel with a very small quantity of cold soft water, and let it steep till the colour of the infusion is a bright yellow. Then strain it. The yellow seeds of lilies will answer nearly the saffron’s purpose.
GREEN.
Take fresh spinach or beet leaves, and pound them in a marble mortar. If you want it for immediate use, take off the green froth as it rises, and mix it with the article you intend to colour. If you wish to keep it a few days, take the juice when you have pressed out a tea-cup full, and adding to it a piece of alum the size of a pea, give it a boil in a sauce-pan.
WHITE
Blanch some almonds, soak them in cold water, and then pound them to a smooth paste in a marble mortar; adding at intervals a little rose water. Thick cream will communicate a white colour.
These preparations may be used for jellies, ice creams, blanc-mange, syllabubs, icing for cakes; and for various articles of confectionary.