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Fruit (Apples chestnuts filberts)

Apples, chestnuts, filberts, grapes, medlars, oranges, pears, walnuts.

Dessert. With moderns the dessert is not so profuse, nor does it hold the same relationship to the dinner that it held with the ancients-the Romans more especially.

On ivory tables they would spread hundreds of different kinds of raw, cooked, and preserved fruits, tarts and cakes, as substitutes for the more substantial comestibles with which the guests were satiated. However, as late as the reigns of our two last Georges, fabulous sums were often expended upon fanciful desserts. The extravagance in dessert of the present day may be said to be in the flowers and other decorations more than in the fruit, the latter being quite subsidiary to the former. The dessert certainly repays, in its general effect, the expenditure upon it of much pains; and it may be said, that if there be any poetry at all in meals, or the process of feeding, there is poetry in the dessert, the materials for which should be selected with taste, and, of course, must depend, in a great measure, upon the season. Pines, melons, grapes, peaches, nectarines, plums, strawberries, apples, pears, oranges, almonds, raisins, figs, walnuts, filberts, medlars, cherries, &c. &c., all kinds of dried fruits, and choice and delicately-flavoured cakes and biscuits make up the dessert, together with the most costly and recherché wines.

The shape, pattern and material of the dessert service are subject to changes of fashion; some persons selecting china, chaste in pattern and colour; others, elegantly-shaped glass ones intermingled with gold. The beauty of the dessert services at the tables of the wealthy tends DESSERT DISHES. to enhance the splendour of the plate, The garnishing of dessert needs especial attention, as the contrast of the brilliantcoloured fruits with nicely-arranged foliage is very charming. Leaves for this purpose should be those of fruit if not of the one they decorate. Strawberry, and vine leaves have a pleasing effect; and for winter desserts, the bay, cuba and laurel are sometimes used. A dessert would not now be considered complete without candied and preserved fruits and confections. The candied fruits may be purchased at a less cost than they can be manufactured at home. They are preserved abroad in most ornamental and elegant forms. And since , from the facilities of travel, we have become so familiar with the tables of the French, chocolate in different forms is indispensable to our desserts. Olives, too, should not be omitted; these should be served in a small, deep glass dish.

Dessert Biscuits (which may be flavoured with ground ginger, cinnamon, &c.) - INGREDIENTS for 4 dishes of biscuits.-1 lb. of flour, lb. of butter, lb. of sifted sugar, the yolks of 6 eggs, flavouring to taste. AVERAGE COST, 1s. 6d..

Put the butter into a basin; warm it, but do not allow it to oil; then with the hand beat it to a cream. Add the flour by degrees, then the sugar and flavouring, and moisten the whole with the yolks of the eggs, which should previously be well beaten. When all the ingredients are thoroughly incorporated, drop the mixture from a spoon on to a buttered paper, leaving a distance between each cake, for they spread as soon as they begin to get warm.

Bake in rather a slow oven from 12 to 18 minutes, and do not let the biscuits acquire too much colour. In making the above quantity, half may be flavoured with ground ginger and the other half with essence of lemon or currants, to make a variety. With whatever the preparation is flavoured, so are the biscuits called, and an endless variety may be made in this manner.

TIME.-12 to 18 minutes, or rather longer, in a very slow oven.