Cassell's dictionary of cookery

method adopted in Portugal for preserving fish consists in removing the viscera and sprinkling sugar over the interior, keeping the fish in a horizontal position, so that the air may penetrate as much as possible. It is said that fish preserved in this way can be kept fresh for a long time, the savour being as perfect as if recently caught. Sahnon thus treated before salting and smoking possess a much more agreeable taste, a table-spoonful of sugar being sufficient for a five-pound fish. Sugar Icings and Glazings, for Cakes, &C. — Take the whites of four eggs without a speck of yolk ; beat them lightly for half a minute till they are frothy, and add one pound of loaf sugar which has been powdered, dried, and sifted. Beat the mixture well with a wooden spoon. Add a tea-spoonful of lemon juice, a few drops at a time. When the liquid looks thick, white, and shining it is ready for use. It should be spread evenly over the cake, which has been already baked and allowed to cool, then it should be dried in a cool oven or before the fire. It may be coloured, if liked, with cochineal, &c. If it is wished to ornament the cake with an ice beading, put a little of the icing into a small piece of white paper twisted into the form of a white sugar-bag. Squeeze this so that the sugar will come out through the hole at the bottom in a thin stream, and with this form any suitable devices on the cake. To impart to pastry a clear glaze which resembles barley-sugar, dip the surface of the pastry into liquid caramel {see Sugar, Boiled from Syrup to Caramel), or sift powdered and dried white sugar thickly upon it, and melt it by holding a salamander or red-hot shovel close to it. This glaze needs to be carefully preserved from damp. Sugar Paste, for Tarts, &e.— Rub four ounces of fresh butter into a pound of flour; add a little salt and three ounces of sugar. "Work the whole into a smooth paste with an egg and a little water. Use as required. Sugar, Pink, for Ornamenting Sweet Dishes {see Piok Sugar). Sugar Roly-poly.— Make a good suet crust ; roll it out as is usual in making rolypoly pudding, and instead of jam spread brown sugar upon it. Finish in the usual way, or send melted butter sweetened with sugar and flavoured with vinegar or lemon- juice to table with it. Sugar, Small Ornaments of.— Soak a little gum tragacanth in water. IMake it into a paste by mixing double refined powdered sugar upon it. Colour this with cochineal, spinach juice, yolk of egg, chocolate, or indigo, &c., to give it the desired tinge, and mould it to any shape. Pretty ornaments may be thus made for cakes and sweet dishes. Sugar, Varieties of. — The sugar met with in commerce is usually of four kinds — brown, or muscovado sugar, clayed sugar, refined or loaf sugar, and sugar candy. The difference between one sort of sugar and another depends altogether on the different mode in which it is prepared.