The Florida agriculturist. [volume] (DeLand, Fla.) 1878-1911, 1884-10-15
Save the Split Oranges.

Without stopping to inquire whether
the splitting of oranges, and their drop
ping prematurely, is due to some cause
that may or may not be prevented: Can
they be applied to some beneficial pur-
pose, SO that they shall not be COM
plete loss to the orange grower? They
are not fit to send to market, and will
completely rot in few days after the
winds have cracked them; and it is bet
ter for the tree and the balance of the
fruit that they be removed from the
tree at once.
Two methods of using them are sug-
gested for the consideration of orange
growers. First, using them in the man
ufacture of Jelly; and, second, in max
ing orange wine.
For Jelly, the skins and decaying por-
tons should be carefully removed, and
the prepared fruit placed in boiling wa
ter long enough to soften the pulp and
allow the juice to be freely pressed out.
The same water may be used for all the
fruit on hand and as it wastes by boil
ing and evaporation, juice from the fruit
may be added, till all the fruit is cooked.
The juice is then to be pressed from the
cooked fruit by press, like those used
in obtaining cider from apples, or wine
from grapes. Small quantities may be
pressed out through a cloth by hand.
The Juice thus obtained, with the water
in which the fruit has been cooked, can
be jellied as the juice of other fruits are
jellied.
Such jellies will find ready sale for
eating with meats, and in preparing
orangeades for the sick and well. The
medicinal properties of the orange
would be nearly all saved in such juice,
and it is too well known to be here set
forth. Two instances from the medical
faculty may be noticed. In one case a
physician cured himself of the smallpox
by drinking the raw juice of lemons, and
a paper was lately read at a medical
and approved by those pres
ent, proving that the juice of the lemon,
lime or orange, prepared not dissimilar
to that here named, and made into jelly
with only small portion of sugar,
given in the early stages of the yellow
fever, until the great thirst of the patient
is allayed, would cure the yellow fever,
that greatly dreaded disease. Hot lime
Juice alone is used to cure the yellow
fever by the common people of the trop-
les. The bitter principle of the peel
and fruit of the whole citrus family is a
well-known febrifuge in all malarial
cases. There is not an orange growing
in Florida in which evil
dence may not be obtained to prove that
so soon as the people can procure oran-
ges and eat them, all levers leave the
eaters. Oranges and iAalarial fevers can
not abide in the same human system.
The expressed juice and water is also
in proper form to receive the sugar, or
better, the glucose, to give weight of
wort for fermentation into orange wine,
whichq alsoHwill contain the medical
quality of the. oranges Indeed, as to
wine-making the trouble and expense of
peeling the fruit may beudispensed with
in medical wine making. For that pur
pose they need only to be cut open to
expedite the cooking of the rind and ex-
tracing the bitter principle, which is not
destroyed by fermentation. Such wine
may not be popular with the wine bib
bers, but for use in the sick room it can
not be excelled.
In conclusion, do not let the splits,
the drops, the plugged, the cracked and
bruised oranges be lost, but add their
juice to your product and money income
by working them up into jellies and
wines. Remember the motto, "a penny
saved is shilling earned Weekly
Times.