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HOW TO PRESERVE CASKS. |
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dissolve an ounce of isinglass, and the whites and shells of 3 eggs ; beat the whole up and proceed as above.
To keep Wines from turning sour.—Boil a gallon of wine with some beaten oyster shells and crabs' claws, burnt to a powder, in the proportion of an ounce of each to every 10 gallons. Strain the liquor through a sieve, and when cold, put it into wine of the same sort, which will acquire a lively taste, A lump of unslacked lime will produce the same effect.
For Wine, when Ropy. — Put a piece of coarse linen cloth around the end of the faucet that goes into the cask, then pour the wine off into a dry one, putting 5 ounces of powdered alum to 30 gallons. Roll and shake the whole well, and it will soon become clarified.
A much more simple and equally efficacious method is, merely to hang a bunch of hysops in at the bunghole.
To sweeten Wine.—Infuse a handful of chary flowers in 30 gals, of wine; then put into a bag 1 pound of dry white mustard seeds, ground, and let it sink to the bottom of the cask. When wine is lowering, or decaying, take an ounce of rock alum and reduce it to powder, draw off 4 gallons of the liquor, mix the powder with it and stir it well for an hour. Fill up the cask and let it fine or ferment, which will be in about a week. Bottle and cork tightly.
To sweeten a Musty Cask.—Take some fresh refuse from a milch cow and mix it with a quantity of warm water, so as to make it sufficiently liquid to pass through a large funnel, previously, however, dissolve in the water 2 pounds of bay salt and of alum. Put the whole into a pot on the fire, stirring it with a stick, and when it is near boiling, pour it into the cask ; then bung it tightly and shake it well for 5 or 6 minutes. Let it remain for 3 hours, then take out the bung to let the vapor escape, after which replace it and give the cask another shaking. At the end of 2 hours rinse it out with cold water till it become perfectly clean ; then have in readiness another pound of bay salt and 1-4 pound of alum boiled in a little water; pour the same into the cask and repeat the process as before.
To take away the ill Scent of Wine.—Take a roll of dough stuck with cloves, hang it in the cask, and it will extract the ill scent from the wine itself.
To keep Wines from becoming acid.—Pour in the cask from the bung, a flask of olive oil, and it will preserve the same from acidity to the last drop.
Varnish or Enamel, for Coating the Inside of Casks.—Anew application of charcoal has recently been made in England for the manufacture of a permanent enamel or varnish for coating the inside of casks. The charcoal, which is made from the wood of the white |
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