Los Angeles daily herald., 1876-02-15
Our Grapes.

Mr.. G. b. Davis received from San
Francisco by this mornings mail a
package of raisins which were cured
by himself in 1874 on the Alden facto.
ry in this city. The raisins aston
ished Mr.. Davis, and made our mouth
water to look at them. A more beau
tiful specimen of raisins never be-
held. They were round, plump, dark
and smooth, having retained their
size and freshness perfectly. But in
addition to all this they contained a
number of crystalized Jumps of sugar,
something we never saw before. Mr..
Deitzler, q large dealer in San Fran
cisco, sent these raisins to Mr.. Davis
by mail and makes the following re-
marks:
Our oflice-boy, in overhauling our fruit
packages several days ago, found about half
u pound of your raisns of 1874, which have
turned into little balls of sugar. have never
seen anything like it in the raisln line, and
the discovery is a most encouraging circuln-
stance, particularly as regards the curing of
raisins by the Alden process. would pay
as samples this coming season.
And we find in the Alta the follow
ing upon the same subject:
Our attention has been called to the pecu-
liar beauty of some white Museat raisins
cured by the Alden process OF Los Angeles in
1874. The grape sugar has formed in them in
large crystals. We have never observed any
similar crystalization in other raisins, and
whether this be owing to some exceptional
t. tn q lNr1D D4lrAn of
sugar in the Los Angeles grapes Is not ascer-
tanned. These raisins are beautiful in their
appearance, and their sugar Is not TO be con-
founded with that observed on the outside OF
Malaga raisins, grown stale by the lapse of
years. Perhaps this crystaliZation suggested
the baseless rumor that plan had been de-
vised lor extracting merchantable sugar from
grapes. We have seen large, white Californ-
an figs dried by the Alden process, not dis
tinguishable in appearance or taste from the
freshest and incest imported from smyrna;
but we do not perceive that they are superior
in flavor to the best of the dried Californian
blue figs, which are more prolific, and on ac-
count of their smaller size, more convenient
for drying The Alden fruit has been adopt
ed by the army authorities. AS the process
has decided advantages over open-air work,
especially for those fruits which must be cut
or opened as n preliminary of drying, and is
the only artificial heatmethOd which has
been applied successfully on large scale in
this State, several new drying houses for it
will probably be built next summer, If no
extensive damage Sn0ulu De uOne 10 the lrult
crop in May.
This circumstance will be worth
mint of money to the vineyardists of
this valley, if they are influenced by
it as wise men should be. The mil
lions of dollars worth of raisins that
are annually shipped to the United
States may all be made in California,
and why not? We have the country,
the soil and the climate, better adapt
ed to it than any other or the globe,
and no other crop pays half so
we'll. One word more while we are on
this subject. The Alden fruit factory
was started too late in the season for
the crop of 1874, and. the late frost last
Spring was so disastrous to fruits thai
nothing was done during that season.
So Mr.. Davis has not yet been able to
develope the process in this county.
But knowing the value Of ii, he has
waited with patience, and if we have
a good fruit and vegetable crop this
year, the people will all be astonished
at the grand success here as they have
been in other countries.