1910 . 
THtC RURAIi NEW-YORKER 
7TS 
Ruralisms 
SOME STRANGE FOODS OF OTHER RACES. 
Part I. 
In all the larger or more cosmopolitan 
cities of America, foods may be pur¬ 
chased of which even the widely-trav¬ 
eled epicure is ignorant. To find these 
strange viands, one must first discover 
the location of the native shops, for, 
almost without exception, each race that 
is represented here has brought its own 
foods, as well as its own language, cus¬ 
toms, and religion. For some reason, 
however, the keepers of these little shops 
are seldom eager to introduce these pro¬ 
ducts to the attention of the American 
public. If you show that you know 
all about them they will produce them, 
and, in all probability, sell them to you 
gladly, but it never seems to occur to 
them to invite a possible customer to 
sample these wares. 
Sun-dried Oysters. —The sun-dried 
oysters, that may be obtained in many 
Chinese shops, are a novelty that is 
well worth trying. Among Chinese epi¬ 
cures they are considered a great dainty, 
and they really are an improvement 
upon many canned oysters that I have 
eaten. At first thought it would seem 
as if there would be little left of the 
oyster after it was thoroughly ^ dried, 
but when they are treated as the Chinese 
prepare them, and are left to lie in a 
fattening rice-flour mush for two or 
three days before they are dried, they 
preserve considerable substance. When 
once well-dried by the rays of the sun, 
oysters will keep almost indefinitely. To 
use them, boil them quickly for half-an- 
hour, and then treat them as you would 
fresh oysters. The Chinese do not al¬ 
ways take the trouble to cook them, for 
it is no uncommon thing to see overland 
travelers, when en route, take them from 
the pocket and eat them dry, as they 
may chance to feel hungry. 
Ball-butter (Butter Preserved in 
Cheese). —American food manufacturers 
have made several unsuccessful attempts 
to preserve sweet butter in tins, yet the 
ball-butter of ancient times, preserved 
in cheeses, is still made to-day, and may 
be purchased in shops that cater to 
people who have come to America from 
Southern European countries. The tech¬ 
nical name of this product is “ball-but¬ 
ter,” and it is so called because it is 
pure, unsalted butter that has been com¬ 
pacted hard into cheese-coverings not 
unlike the Edam cheese in shape. So 
prepared, both the butter and the cheese 
will keep for months, if very high tem¬ 
peratures are avoided, for one helps to 
preserve the other. The cheese prevents 
the butter from spoiling, and the butter 
keeps the cheese from becoming too hard. 
If kept for a very long time, the butter may 
acquire a slight tinge of the cheese flavor; 
yet this flavor may sometimes be noticed 
even in very good table butter, and it 
never becomes objectionable. I know 
that this is so, for I have used scores 
of them, and some of them have been 
pretty old. The idea of putting butter 
into cheese-shells is a very ancient one, 
for it is mentioned in the travels of 
Marco Polo. Even then its advantages 
were recognized and approved, as it 
could scarcely fail to be, in view of the 
fact that it represented no useless weight 
of baggage. Thus, when the top of the 
casein covering is removed, and the but¬ 
ter has been used, the traveler finds the 
three-quarter shell a good makeshift cup 
for drinks, like milk, or tea. It will 
even resist scalding liquids, although 
hot tea will stain it a little, but the cheese 
will impart no disagreeable flavor to the 
tea. I have even known these tea-shells, 
when emptied, to make good additions to 
the soup-pot; while the Ligurian alpinists, 
who often need a short-shift light in 
their mountain shacks, stick a wax vesta 
through a long pin and insert it in the 
partly-opened “ball-butter.” It makes a 
capital night-light, and will burn for 
hours. 
Giant Beans. —Beans have long been 
a staple in many American families, yet 
most of them use the small beans that 
are almost half indigestible skin. During 
the past few years, the giant bean of 
Southern Europe has been grown to 
some extent in this country, but those 
that are sold in the native shops are still 
imported. In size, one of them would 
make more than half-a-dozen of the or¬ 
dinary small American bean. When 
dried, these beans are light green in 
color, and, when soaked over night and 
given a vigorous boil, they soften into a 
thick, rich flavored pulp. By this pro¬ 
cess of soaking and boiling, they may be 
swollen to the size of a small five o’clock 
tea biscuit, and may be easily skinned. 
Stringed Walnuts. —A curiosity that 
Americans will probably be slow to adapt, 
but that finds favor among the Syrians, 
is the string of walnuts. To keep the 
nuts from spoiling, or the oil from evap¬ 
orating, the shelled nuts are strung on 
stout white twine, after which they are 
dipped in batter composed of durum 
flour and the expressed juice of sultana 
raisins. When dry, they are given an¬ 
other dip; and this process is repeated 
until a sufficiently thick coating has been 
obtained. Just before being served, the 
nuts are given a slight soaking, after 
which they are sent to the table as the 
natural accompaniment to the black 
Turkish coffee. Shelled nuts on strings 
may also be obtained in the Italian shops, 
although the Italians demand better prices 
for the “stringed” filberts and chestnuts 
than the best of stores would dream of 
asking for ordinary nuts. The filberts, 
and sometimes the chestnuts, are eaten 
raw, but, more often, the latter are boiled 
and served as a vegetable, like beans. 
Smoked Pears. —The Latin-Europeans 
are also extremely fond of smoked pears, 
and great quantities are sold in the large 
cities of this country every year. They 
are imported from Southern Europe in 
150 pound sacks, and are wrinkled, un¬ 
wholesome-looking objects, always black 
and dirty in appearance. Yet they retail 
at a good price, 15 to 20 cents a pound. 
Fruit-sheeting. —The fruit and bread 
sheetings of Asia-Minor and the Tigris- 
Euphrates valley are not easily found in 
American cities, yet many bales of these 
strange foods are imported annually, and, 
where there are many Levantines who 
have not become too thoroughly Ameri¬ 
canized, the seeker after those viands 
will be very likely to find the object of 
his search. Moreover, once found, they 
will prove well worth the trouble of 
looking them up. The fruit-sheeting is 
composed almost entirely of pure apricots, 
just the pulp-residue after the juice has 
been expressed for subsequent concen¬ 
tration into the fruit essence of Levan¬ 
tine commerce. This residual pulp is 
turned out on a bed of straw, and left 
in the sun to dry. The sheets are then 
pasted, end to end, in lengths, overlap¬ 
ping one another a trifle, and are fas¬ 
tened together with a paste made of the 
pulp and juice of the fruit. When these 
pieces are many yards in length, they are 
wound up into bales like so much cloth, 
and, in the interior marts and bazars, 
are usually sold by the 40-inch yard. 
When properly sun-dried, the fruit sheets 
are clean to handle. They never make 
the fingers sticky, and may even be 
carried in the pocket. In color, they are 
a rich brown, and not only have a most 
agreeable fruity odor, but possess a 
pleasant slightly acidulant flavor, due to 
the fruit acid which the sheets contain. 
They become quite limp on the approach 
of wet weather, and so are used by 
Asiatics in lieu of a barometer—just as 
the American fisherman utilizes a strip 
of seaweed, knowing that its salt content 
will attract moisture. In spite of this 
fact, the fruit-sheeting does not become 
moldy if kept in any airy place. By the 
addition of even cold water, and without 
boiling, a piece of the sheet can, after 
a few minutes stirring, be reduced to a 
pulp for serving at table, in which con¬ 
dition it is scarcely distinguishable from 
ordinary unsweetened dried fruits. 
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DAILY 
OUTPUT 
17,500 
8BLS. 
YEARLY 
OUTPUT 
OVER 
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Our Tile 
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— 
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Oi — 
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ASPHALT 
• * *» * . 
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