THE MODE OF COOKING BEST ADAPTED TO DIFFERENT KINDS OF FISH.
It is not possible, the reader will easily believe, to insert in a work of the size of the present volume, all the modes of dressing the many varieties of fish which are suited to our tables; we give, therefore, only the more essential receipts in detail, and add to them such general information as may, we trust, enable even a moderately intelligent cook to serve all that may usually be required, without difficulty.
There is no better way of dressing a good turbot, brill, John Dory, or cod’s head and shoulders, than plain but careful boiling. Salmon is excellent in almost every mode in which it can be cooked or used. Boiled entire or in crimped slices; roasted in a cradle-spit or Dutch oven; baked; fried in small collops; collared; potted; dried and smoked; pickled or soused (this is the coarsest and least to be recommended process for it, of any); made into a raised or common pie, or a potato-pasty; served cold in or with savoury jelly, or with a Mayonnaise sauce; or laid on potatoes and baked, as in Ireland, it will be found Good.
Soles may be either boiled, or baked, or fried entire, or in fillets; curried; stewed in cream; or prepared by any of the directions given for them in the body of this chapter.
Plaice, unless when in full season and very fresh, is apt to be watery and insipid; but taken in its perfection and carefully cooked, it is very sweet and delicate in flavour. If large, it may be boiled with advantage either whole or in fillets; but to many tastes it is very superior when filleted, dipped into egg and bread-crumbs, and fried. The flesh may also be curried; or the plaice may be converted into water-souchy, or soupe-maigre: when small it is often fried whole.
Red mullet should always be baked, broiled, or roasted: it should on no occasion be boiled.
Mackerel, for which many receipts will be found in this chapter, when broiled quite whole, as we have directed, or freed from the bones, divided, egged, crumbed, and fried, is infinitely superior to the same fish cooked in the ordinary manner.
The whiting, when very fresh and in season, is always delicate and good; and of all fish is considered the best suited to invalids. Perhaps quite the most wholesome mode of preparing it for them, is to open it as little as possible when it is cleansed, to leave the skin on, to dry the fish well, and to broil it gently. It should be sent very hot to table, and will require no sauce: twenty minutes will usually be required to cook it, if of moderate size.
The haddock is sometimes very large. We have had it occasionally from our southern coast between two and three feet in length, and it was then remarkably good when simply boiled, even the day after it was caught, the white curd between the flakes of flesh being like that of extremely fresh salmon. As it is in full season in mid-winter, it can be sent to a distance without injury. It is a very firm fish when large and in season; but, as purchased commonly at inland markets, is often neither fine in size nor quality. One of the best modes of cooking it is, to take the flesh entire from the bones, to divide it, dip it into egg and bread-crumbs, mixed with savoury herbs finely minced, and a seasoning of salt and spice, and to fry it like soles. Other receipts for it will be found in the body of this chapter.
The flesh of the gurnard is exceedingly dry, and somewhat over firm, but when filled with well-made forcemeat and gently baked, it is much liked by many persons. At good tables, it is often served in fillets fried or baked, and richly sauced: in common cookery it is sometimes boiled.
Portions only of the skate, which is frequently of enormous size, are used as food: these are in general cut out by the fisherman or by the salesman, and are called the wings. The flesh is commonly served here divided into long narrow fillets, called crimped skate, which are rolled up and fastened, to preserve them in that form, while they are cooked. In France, it is sent to table raised from the bones in large portions, sauced with beurre-noir (burned or browned butter), and strewed with well-crisped parsley.
Trout, which is a delicious fish when stewed in gravy, either quite simply, or with the addition of wine and various condiments, and which when of small size is very sweet and pleasant, eating nicely fried, is poor and insipid when plainly boiled.[[43]]
[43]. We have been informed by Mr. Howitt, the well-known author of several highly interesting works on Germany, that this fish, when boiled the instant it was caught—as he had eaten it often on the banks of some celebrated German trout-streams—was most excellent, especially when it was of large size; but, as a general rule, almost any other mode of cooking is to be recommended for it in preference.
Pike, of which the flesh is extremely dry, is we think better baked than dressed in any other way; but it is often boiled.
Carp should either be stewed whole in the same manner as trout, or served cut in slices, in a rich sauce called a matelote.
Smelts, sand-eels, and white-bait, are always fried; the last two sometimes after being dipped into batter.