(Swedish Receipt.)
Soak, skin, split, and bone a large Norway herring; lay the two sides along a dish, and slice them slopingly (or substitute for this one or two fine Dutch herrings). Arrange in symmetrical order over the fish slices of cooked beet-root, cold boiled potatoes, and pickled gherkins; then add one or two sharp apples chopped small, and the yolks and whites, separately minced, of some hard-boiled eggs, with any thing else which may be at hand, and may serve to vary tastefully the decoration of the dish. Place these ingredients in small heaps of well-contrasting colours on the surface of the salad, and lay a border of curled celery leaves or parsley round the bowl. For sauce, rub the yolk of one hard-boiled egg quite smooth with some salt; to this add oil and vinegar as for an ordinary salad, and dilute the whole with some thick sour cream.
Obs.—“Sour cream” is an ingredient not much approved by English taste, but it enters largely into German cookery, and into that of Sweden, and of other northern countries also. About half a pound of cold beef cut into small thin shavings or collops, is often added to a herring-salad abroad: it may be either of simply roasted or boiled, or of salted and smoked meat.
TARTAR SAUCE.
(Sauce à la Tartare).
Add to the preceding remoulade, or to any other sauce of the same nature, a teaspoonful or more of made mustard, one of finely-minced shalots, one of parsley or tarragon, and one of capers or of pickled gherkins, with a rather high seasoning of cayenne, and some salt if needed. The tartar-mustard of the previous chapter, or good French mustard, is to be preferred to English for this sauce, which is usually made very pungent, and for which any ingredients can be used to the taste which will serve to render it so. Tarragon vinegar, minced tarragon and eschalots, and plenty of oil, are used for it in France, in conjunction with the yolks of one or two eggs, and chopped capers, or gherkins, to which olives are sometimes added.
SHRIMP CHATNEY.
(Mauritian Receipt.)
Shell with care a quart of fresh shrimps (for the mode of doing this see Chapter [III].), mince them quickly upon a dish with a large sharp knife, then turn them into a mortar and pound them to a perfectly smooth paste. Next, mix with them very gradually two or three spoonsful of salad oil of the best quality, some young green chilies chopped small (or when these cannot be procured, some good cayenne pepper as a substitute), some young onions finely minced, a little salt if required, and as much vinegar or strained lemon juice as will render the sauce pleasantly acid. Half a saltspoonful or more of powdered ginger is sometimes used in addition to the above ingredients.
When they are preferred, two or three small shalots minced and well bruised with the shrimps may be substituted for the onions.[[65]] The proportion of oil should be double that of the vinegar used; but in this preparation, as in all others of the same nature, individual taste must regulate the proportion of the most powerful condiments which enter into its composition. All chatneys should be quite thick, almost of the consistence of mashed turnips, or stewed tomatas, or stiff bread sauce. They are served with curries; and also with steaks, cutlets, cold meat, and fish. In the East the native cooks crush to a pulp upon a stone slab, and with a stone roller, the ingredients which we direct to be pounded. On occasion the fish might be merely minced. When beaten to a paste, they should be well separated with a fork as the chilies, &c., are added.