I am not partial to the decorating of salmon with softened butter, coloured or not, laid on by means of the piping-bag. Apart from the fact that this method of decoration is rarely artistic, the butter used combines badly with the cold sauces and the meat of the salmon on the diner’s plate. Very green tarragon leaves, chervil, lobster coral, &c., afford a more natural and more delicate means of ornamentation. The only butter fit to be served with cold salmon is Montpellier butter (No. [153]), though this, in fact, is but a cold sauce often resorted to for the coating of the cold fish in question.
Among the garnishes which suit cold salmon, I might mention small peeled, and emptied tomatoes garnished with some kind of salad; hard-boiled eggs, either wholly stuffed, or stuffed in halves or in quarters, [barquettes], tartlets and [cassolettes] made from cucumber or beetroot, parboiled until almost completely cooked and garnished with a purée of tunny, of [274] ]sardines, of anchovies, &c.; small aspics of shrimps or of crayfishes’ tails; small slices of lobster, &c.
Almost all the cold sauces may accompany cold salmon.
[801—SAUMON FROID, OU DARNE DE SAUMON FROID A LA ROYALE]
Having drained and dried the salmon or the [darne], remove the skin from one of its sides, and coat the bared fillets with a layer of a preparation of [mousse] de saumon, letting it lie rather more thickly over the middle than the sides. Coat the layer of [mousse] with mayonnaise sauce thickened by means of fish jelly, and leave to set.
Now let some clear fish jelly set on the bottom of the dish to be sent to the table; place the salmon or the [darne] on this jelly, and surround the piece with a border consisting of Montpellier butter, using for the purpose a piping-bag fitted with a grooved pipe.
Decorate the centre of the piece by means of a fine fleur-de-lys made from truffles, and encircle it with two royale crowns made from anchovy fillets.
[802—SAUMON FROID OU DARNE DE SAUMON A LA PARISIENNE]
Remove the skin in suchwise as to leave the bared portion in the shape of a regular rectangle, equidistant from the tail and the head; or, in the case of a [darne], occupying two-thirds of its surface.
Cover the bared portion with mayonnaise sauce thickened with fish jelly and leave it to set.