ake
sure that all the pieces are separated and that the hot syrup comes into
contact with all the surfaces of the confections.

Pour the hot mass over the rack--in position in the pan--and immediately
put a board over the pan. Make sure that the vegetable is evenly
distributed. The wood absorbs the moisture while a tin cover would make
trouble by causing the steam to condense and drop back onto the candy.
Leave the pan undisturbed for twenty-four hours. Then lift the rack out,
pour the syrup into the kettle and cook to two hundred and twenty
degrees. Return the vegetable to the syrup and stir carefully; each
piece must be immersed. The small pieces of candy will be heated through
in so very short a time that it is necessary only to make sure that each
piece has been thoroughly immersed in the hot syrup. Make sure that the
rack is clean and free from particles of the syrup. Thereupon, again
pour it over the rack arranged in the pan as before. Repeat the process
four times, each time cooking the syrup two degrees hotter. The result
is a slow crystallization which covers the candy so that it is perfectly
preserved and very good to taste and look upon. Although the work must
be distributed over six days, only a very few minutes are required
except upon the first day.

=Parsnip Boutonniere.=--The candied parsnip forms the basis of one of
the most decorative of all boutonnieres. For each of them have ready,
besides a supply of the parsnips, candied as above, artificial fern,
sometimes sold under the name "imitation air plant," a lace mat, a
number twenty-two wire, and one yard of ribbon one-half inch wide, the
preferred color. See the illustration opposite page 72.

Mix one cupful of sugar and one-third cupful of water, and color the
same as the ribbon. Cook the syrup thus made to two hundred and
twenty-five degrees. Into this hot syrup drop the crystallized parsnips,
and allow them to remain a few minutes. After they have become
thoroughly and evenly colored, pour them upon a wire screen. After they
have dried, attach to about two dozen of them pieces of wire about six
inches long. It is well to place a drop of thick syrup at the point at
which the wire enters the candy.

Cut the ferns into lengths of from two to four inches. Mix the wired
candies through the bunch of ferns, occasionally twisting a strand of
fern around the wires so that all wires will be hidden. Slip the lace
mat up over the wires and the ends of the fe