How to Boil Fish.
Fresh fish should always be put on to cook in salted boiling water. A little lemon juice or vinegar in the water makes the flesh of the fish firmer and improves the flavor. For some tastes the flavor is improved still more by putting in the water, tied in a piece of cheese-cloth, a few spoonfuls of minced onion, carrot, and celery, two bay leaves, a sprig each of thyme, parsley, and summer savory, a small bit of cinnamon, and two whole cloves. There should be only water enough to cover the fish. If there be a fish-kettle with a tray, lay the fish in the tray and do not wrap it in a cloth. If, however, there be no regular fish-kettle, pin the fish in a piece of cloth, put a large plate in the bottom of a large flat saucepan, and lay the fish on this. A thick square of fish will take longer to cook than the same number of pounds cut from a long, slender fish. A small cod, haddock, bluefish, lake trout, salmon trout, whitefish, etc., weighing from three to five pounds, will require thirty minutes’ cooking. The water should bubble only at the side of the saucepan. A large fish of the same kind, weighing six or eight pounds, would require only ten minutes’ more time. A thick square or cube of halibut or salmon, weighing from three to five pounds, would require forty minutes’ cooking; and if it weighed six or eight pounds, it would require an hour. If the fish be put into cold water the juices will be drawn out. The fish will be broken if the water be allowed to boil hard during the cooking. A good sauce should always be served with boiled fish.