Cream of tartar

“ The effect of the cold water is mechanical. When boiling water is applied sufficiently, crystallization and re-crystallization take place, and the product is the cream of tartar of medicine and commerce. There is refinement in the latter case, but no chemical change is wrought. Argols are used also for making tartaric acid, Rochelle salts, the preparation of tartrate of antimony, and potash called tartar emetic, as a mordant in dyeing, and for other purposes. Argols and crude tartar are synonyms. ”

“ Tartrates.—The acid potash salt, , "cream of tartar," is prepared from crude tartar (argol) by dissolving it in hot water, filtering off what remains of tartrate of lime and other impurities, and allowing the filtrate to crystallize. The crystals are generally contaminated with a little of the lime-salt, for the removal of which the best method is to treat the powdered crystals with cold dilute hydrochloric acid and then wash them with cold water by displacement. The lime passes into the filtrate. ”

“ When soda and cream of tartar are mixed dry, they do not react on each other, neither do they combine rapidly in cold moist dough, but as soon as the heat of the oven penetrates the doughy mass, the cream of tartar combines with the soda and sets free the gas needed to raise the dough. ”

“ These oils being powerful, popular and expensive, they are frequently adulterated. Cream of tartar and tartaric acid on account of the price is often increased, the former with different cheap powders, the latter usually with alum. Many people fail in the process through no fault of their own, but simply through their being supplied with inferior ingredients, it is therefore of importance, that colors and flavors should be purchased at some respectable house ”

“ Tarraye, for To arraye, to array, arrange, E 961.
Tart, adj. of sharp flavour, pungent, A 381.
Tartre, s. tartar, G 813; oille of Tartre, (probably) cream of tartar, or bitartrate of potassium, A 630. F. tartre, Low Lat. tartarum. 'An acid concrete salt, deposited from wines when perfectly fermented; ... when in the crude state, it is much used as a flux in the assaying of ores' ”

“ Then give a half-teaspoon table salt twice a day for two or three days.
An old-fashioned home remedy is one-quarter teaspoonful cream of tartar in one-quarter glass of water three times a day, at morning, noon and evening, for three days.
If hives persist, see doctor.
“Did you have it all planned to give us this lesson. Miss Helpem?” asked Soami Brave, while the girls bathed their sunburned faces as directed, and treated the poison ivy rash with the Epsom salt solution. ”

“ It is a trick—for it deserves no better name—of our rivals to show by chemical analysis that my powder contains alum, but are careful neither to state the kind nor the change it undergoes in baking. The manufacturer who knowingly misrepresents the goods of a rival, may well be doubted when he speaks of the quality of his own.
"Great stress is laid on the fact that cream tartar is a vegetable acid, the product of the grape, hence it must be healthy. They forget that cream tartar is not entirely vegetable, but principally second handed minerals. ”

“ If tartaric acid be present, a white, crystalline precipitate of cream of tartar will be produced on agitation. When pure it is devoid of colour, is entirely, or almost entirely, decomposed by heat. It is soluble in water and in spirit, and what is thrown down from its watery solution by acetate of lead is dissolved by nitric acid. No salt of potassium precipitates anything with citric acid except the tartrate. When a few drops of a solution of citric acid are added to lime water, a clear liquid results, which, when heated, deposits a white powder, soluble in acids without effervescence. ”

“ Then take tartar, 4 pounds, tin liquor, 2 pounds 8 ounces, and 3 pounds of the paste; make a hot bath with sufficient water, and enter the goods for 3/4 hour; afterwards carefully rinse and dry.
Crimson For Silk.—For 1 pound of goods, use alum, 3 ounces; dip at hand heat 1 hour; take out and drain, while making a new dye, by boiling for 10 minutes, cochineal, 3 ounces; bruised nutgalls, 2 ounces; and cream of tartar, 1/2 ounce, in 1 pail of water. When a little cool begin to dip, raising the heat to a boil, continuing to dip 1 hour. ”

“ I have made a large number of analyses of Royal Baking Powder, and have found it to be an absolutely pure cream of tartar powder, entirely free from alum, ammonia, and all adulterations and impurities. In leavening power it is of the very highest. ”

“ In the beginning of the disease, brisk laxatives, consisting of rhubarb and cream of tartar, may be of immediate service to the young and robust, but to aged or debilitated patients, we cannot with safety recommend either purgatives or emetics, as the latter in particular, may be attended with serious consequences. ”

“ Alum or aluminium sulphate (8%) , along with acid potassium tartrate (cream of tartar) (7%) , is used for brighter colours—e.g. reds, yellows, &c. The object of the tartar is to retard the mordanting process and ensure the penetration of the wool by the mordant, by preventing superficial precipitation through the action of ammonia liberated from the wool; it ensures the ultimate production of clear, bright, full colours. For still brighter colours, notably yellow and red, stannous chloride was at one time largely employed, now it is used less frequently ”

“ Common grades of the salt contain a little sodium chloride, and in some cases as much as 2 per cent. of the corresponding sulphate; it may also prove to be somewhat deficient in the proportion of carbonic acid present. Cream of tartar (potassium bitartrate) , is far more liable to adulteration. A certain quantity of calcium tartrate is often found in the commercial article, originating from its method of manufacture, and amounting, on the average, from 6 to 7 per cent. The salt is, moreover, sometimes intentionally mixed with alum, starch, tartaric acid, gypsum, chalk and terra alba. ”

“ Beat the butter to a cream, and gradually beat the sugar into it. Beat the eggs separately, and add to the sugar and butter. Dissolve the soda in the milk, and stir into the mixture. Now add the flour, in which the cream of tartar should be mixed. Flavor with any spice or extract you like, or with the grated yellow rind of a lemon and one tablespoonful of the juice. Pour the batter into a buttered pan, and bake in a moderate oven for forty-five minutes, if in a deep loaf ”

“ If cream of tartar is not used, a few drops of lemon-juice should be added at the crack stage. If the sugar passes the degree desired, add a spoonful of water and continue the boiling. No sugar need ever be wasted unless it becomes burned. ”

“ As soon as the symptoms are a little abated, and the patient is able to swallow, he ought to drink freely of some diluting opening liquor, as a decoction of tamarinds and liquorice, cream-tartar-whey, or common whey with cream of tartar dissolved in it. Or he may take any cooling purge, as Glauber’s salt, manna dissolved in an infusion of senna, or the like. All spirits and other strong liquors are to be avoided. Even volatile salts held to the nose do mischief. ”

“ Tar′trāte, a salt of tartaric acid.—Tartar emetic, a compound of potassium and antimony.—Cream of tartar (see Cream) . [Fr. tartre—Low L. tartarum—Ar. durd, dregs.]
Tartar, tär′tar, n. a native of Tartary in Asia: an irritable person, or one too strong for his assailant.
Tartarus, tär′ta-rus, n. the lower world generally, but esp. the place of punishment for the wicked, according to Homer, a deep and sunless abyss, as far below Hades as earth is below heaven, and closed in by iron gates— (Shak.) Tar′tar: (Spens.) Tar′tary.—adj. Tartā′rean. ”

“ It is better not to mix too much at a time, as it is apt to get damp. About four teaspoonsful of soda and two of acid is a convenient quantity, and to about a pound of flour use one teaspoonful of powder. Many cooks prefer cream of tartar to the stronger acid: possibly one is as good as the other, but the tartaric acid being stronger I prefer it. In mixing the baking powder into anything, it should always be rubbed in with the dry flour; if put in when the mixture is moist it effervesces at once, so half or three parts of its effect is lost before the cake is ready. ”

“ The chemical substances left in foods by the union of soda and cream of tartar in baking powders cannot be used by the system, so the excretory organs are overworked in their efforts to throw them off. ”

“ Occasional doses of mild saline aperients (Epsom salts, cream of tartar, or phosphate of soda, or of sulphur combined with cream of tartar) should be taken, and warm or tepid bathing, preferably in sea-water, or, if not convenient, rain water, frequently had recourse to. Stimulants of all kinds should be avoided, and the red meats, ripe fruits, and the antiscorbutic vegetables should form a considerable portion of the diet. ”

“ This part of the process is often performed by mere digestion for a few days, without the application of heat. Leaden or stoneware vessels are used as crystallisers. Good cream of tartar requires 26% of chalk and 28·5% of dry chloride of calcium for its perfect decomposition. Dry tartrate of lime requires 75% of oil of vitriol to liberate the whole of its tartaric acid. A very slight excess of sulphuric acid may be safely, nay, advantageously, employed. Some manufacturers bleach the coloured solution of the first crystals by treating it with animal charcoal ”

“ If kept too long, it causes often terrible pain when applied to eruptive sores. There must be no "watering" or doctoring with cream of tartar, if good results are desired. If the milk be too long kept, and cannot be had fresh, it may be mixed with a little sweet milk and all churned well together. ”

“ At the same time open up the portal circulation by the use of equal parts of sulphur and cream of tartar, a teaspoonful in syrup or mixed with sugar, once or twice a day for a few days, or any other suitable means to put the bowel and piles at rest. Often patients will know what will relieve them of this condition better than the physician, as what relieves one will sometimes aggravate another. ”

“ Method.—Mix the sugar and cream of tartar. Add the boiling water and place over a moderate fire, stirring slowly and steadily until the sugar is dissolved. Do not stir after the mixture begins to boil, but let it boil slowly until the sirup will form a soft ball in cold water. Turn out on a platter without scraping the saucepan. The success of the fondant depends upon the complete changing of the cane sugar into fructose and glucose, the crystals of the latter being much finer than those of cane sugar. ”

“ When cold, add 1 oz. cream of tartar, 1⁄2 oz. alum, 2 ozs. glycerin, and water sufficient to make 16 ozs. of filtered solution. Then add 4 ozs. of honey and set aside a few days to see if fermentation occurs. Carefully mix the liquid with 2 lbs. prepared chalk, 13⁄4 ozs. orris powder and 3⁄4 ozs. cassia powder.
Non-fermenting cherry tooth-paste.—Fine powdered pumice stone 2 ozs., powdered orris root 2 ozs., powdered myrrh 1⁄2 oz., honey 4 ozs., sufficient liquid cochineal to color, oil of cloves 1⁄2 drachm, essence of lemon 11⁄2 drachms, rose oil 8 drops. Mix well. ”

“ These materials tend to keep apart the particles of acid and base and render it possible to make a mixture of them which may be kept for a long while without any notable loss of leavening power. When a cream of tartar baking powder is mixed with dough the moisture of the dough gradually dissolves the two ingredients and in this state a chemical reaction occurs between them. The carbon dioxid is set free as a gas, commonly known as carbonic acid. The mineral substance which results is a tartrate of sodium and potassium that is a union of tartaric acid with potash and soda. ”

“ When the mass begins to thicken, pour it between oiled candy bars on an oiled marble so that it will form a layer three-quarters of an inch thick. When cool, cover one-quarter of an inch thick with a frosting made of one cupful of sugar, one-quarter cupful of water, and one-eighth teaspoonful of cream of tartar, boiled without stirring to two hundred and thirty-four degrees and then flavored with a few drops of vanilla and lemon and beaten until creamy. When set,—a quick process—cut the mass into pieces about one-half inch wide and one and one-half inches long. ”

“ They were first prepared by John Rhodolphus Glauber, a celebrated chemist of the 17th century; and are of considerable use in medicine as cooling purgatives, when taken in doses from six to twelve drams: they also prove excellent aperients in various chronical disorders, such as habitual costiveness, for which small doses of one dram of this salt, with two scruples of cream of tartar, and one scruple of sal-ammoniac dissolved in water, may be given with advantage, three or four times a day. ”

“ Dextro-tartaric acid occurs in the free state or as the potassium or calcium salt in grape juice and in various unripe fruits. During the alcoholic fermentation of grape juice it is deposited in the form of an impure acid potassium tartrate which is known as arg&l, and when purified as cream of tartar. For the preparation of the acid the crude argol is boiled with hydrochloric acid and afterwards precipitated as calcium tartrate by boiling with milk of lime, the calcium salt being afterwards decomposed by sulphuric acid. ”