1246 The Cornell Reading-Courses 



taking out a portion of the hot jelly and allowing it to cool to see if it 

 "jells"; for, while this cooling process is going on, unfortunate things 

 may be happening in the saucepan. Time is too precious at this point to 

 wait for any cooling of samples; when the jelly is just right to be taken 

 off the fire, no time should be lost in removing it. 



THE PROPORTION OF SUGAR TO JUICE 



Extraction I 



In making jelly from these various extractions, let us first consider 

 Extraction I. Assuming that this juice has been obtained from a naturally 

 good jelly-making fruit, that is, one rich in pectin and also acidic (sour) — 

 for example, currants, sour apples, unripe grapes, and the like — then the 

 process of making jelly is comparatively simple. Under such conditions, 

 success or failure depends almost entirely on the proportion of sugar used ; 

 the correct proportion of sugar to the juice in hand means success, while 

 an underproportion means a tough jelly, and an overproportion means 

 more or less of a failure, depending on how great that overproportion is. 

 Probably more good jelly-making material is spoiled through the use of 

 an overproportion of sugar than from all other causes combined — and 

 this because the would-be jelly-maker blindly follows the old rule of a 

 measure of juice to a measure of sugar. 



This exceedingly important point, then, the correct proportion of sugar 

 to juice, needs to be very thoroughly understood. In studying it, let us 

 first consider the result of making jelly from fruit juice alone, that is, 

 without sugar. If a certain volume (say i cup, i pint, i quart) of good 

 jelly-making fruit juice is boiled down until a jelly test is observed, we 

 find on cooling the very small product that it is jelly-like, but it is not an 

 ideal jelly. It is a tough, opaque, unpalatable mass, consisting of the 

 pectin, more or less impure, which was contained in the original volume 

 of juice. 



Second, let us consider the results of boiling sugar in varying propor- 

 tions with a volume of juice equal to that used above. If this volume of 

 juice is boiled with, say, one fourth its volume of sugar until the jelly test 

 is observed, we find, on cooHng, a larger product than the preceding — 

 one more like jelly, one less opaque, though still tough. Continuing this 

 process and taking successive equal volumes of juice as that taken first, 

 and boiling each successively with an increasing proportion of sugar 

 (one half volume, two thirds, three fourths, one, one and one fourth, and 

 so on), what are the final results? Examination of them shows that with 

 increasing proportion of sugar each product increases in volume, and each 

 is more tender, more transparent, more palatable, than its predecessor, 



