Important: Safety Warning
This page gives advice for salvaging or disguising food that has begun to spoil. Spoiled food can carry dangerous bacteria and toxins that no washing, soaking, or seasoning removes; it should be discarded.
This page recommends preserving food with chemicals such as salicylic acid, borax, or formaldehyde. These substances are toxic when eaten, and their use in food is now prohibited.
This information has been left in for historical purposes but should not be acted upon.
Home › Vinegar, Pickles, and Pickling › Vinegar, Pickles, and Pickling: Preserve
Vinegar, Pickles, and Pickling: Preserve
To Preserve Meat from Flies. -In addition to the germs that cause putrefaction, fresh meat is liable to be visited by flies and other insects for the purpose of depositing their eggs, and these will, in warm weather, quickly hatch and produce maggots.
A cloth moistened with vinegar prevents the approach of insects. Or the meat may be rubbed with ground pepper or ginger. It may also be protected by a coating of waxed paper. To prepare this paper, melt with gentle heat 5 ounces of stearic acid. Stir in 2 ounces of carbolic acid and add, in a thin stream, 5 ounces of melted paraffin, stirring constantly. Remove from the fire and continue to stir until the mixture sets. Again melt with gentle heat, and apply with a brush to suitable paper. Wrap up the meat in the paper and seal.
To Preserve Fish. - To keep fish fresh without ice for any length of time is very difficult. But if ice is not available, wash inside and out with a solution of equal parts of vinegar and water. Lay the fish on an earthenware platter on a stone floor. Place in the inside of each fish a cheese-cloth bag containing fresh charcoal in small lumps, about the size of small peas or large gravel stones, and wrap in a cloth moistened with vinegar, or equal parts of vinegar and water. In very hot weather remove the cloth and bag of charcoal two or three times a day and dip the fish into cold salt water. Afterwards wrap up as before.
Or if the fish shows signs of decay, immerse in a pickle of vinegar and water.