YANKEE CHOWDER.—
Having sliced very thin some salt fat pork, season it with pepper, lay it in the bottom of a large iron pot, set it over the fire, and let it fry. When done, take out the pork, leaving the liquid fat in the bottom. Next, peel and slice some onions, and lay them on the fat. Pour in sufficient clam or oyster liquor to stew the onions. Have ready a sufficient quantity of sea-bass, black fish, tutaug, porgie, haddock, or fresh cod. Cut the fish in small pieces, and put it into the pot. Add plenty of potatos pared and quartered. Then some clam liquor; and lastly, some crackers, (soaked and split,) or some soda biscuit; the crackers to cover the top. If you wish to fill a large pot, repeat all these ingredients, arranging them in layers. If there is not gravy enough, add some boiling milk, poured in at the last, and enriched with bits of butter mixed with flour. Cover the pot closely, and let it stew half an hour, or more, till all the contents are thoroughly done. You may bake the chowder in an iron oven, over a wood fire, heaping live coals on the oven lid.
CLAM CHOWDER.—
Put into boiling water from fifty to a hundred of the small sand clams; and when all their shells have opened, take them out, as they are then sufficiently boiled. Extract all the hard, or tough, uneatable part, and throw it away. Slice thin as much salt pork as, when fried in the bottom of a large pot, will produce half a pint of liquid or gravy. Take out all the pork, leaving the liquid in the pot. Add to it a layer of clams. Then a layer of biscuit soaked in milk or warm water. Next another layer of clams; then another layer of soaked biscuit; then more clams. Season it with pepper and mace. If there is no objection to onions, add three or four boiled and sliced, and some minced marjoram. Also, some potatos, boiled, peeled, and quartered. Let the last layer be clams, and then cover the whole with a good paste, and bake it in an iron oven, or boil it in an iron pot.
Chowder of fresh codfish, halibut, sea-bass, or any other good fish, is made as above. Halibut requires a much larger portion of seasoning, and a little more pork. Though very large and therefore very profitable, it is in itself the most tasteless of all fish. Plain boiled halibut is not worth eating.
SALMON.—
In choosing a salmon, see that the gills are a fine red, the eyes full, the scales clear, and the whole fish stiff; the flesh being of the peculiar red known as salmon-color. Between the flakes is a substance called the curd, which gives it firmness. By keeping, this substance melts down and the flesh becomes soft. A salmon can only be eaten in perfection on the sea-coast where it was caught, and on the same day. To transport it any distance, it must be enclosed in a box, and well packed in ice. In America, salmon is found in the greatest perfection on the coast of Maine, in the Kennebec. Very fine ones are brought to Boston market. They also abound on the coasts of California and Oregon. The American salmon is much larger than those of Europe. It is so fine a fish that its own flavor is better than any that can be communicated except by the most simple sauce. It requires as much boiling as meat, that is, a quarter of an hour for every pound. It is in season from May till August or September.
The lake salmon is good, but inferior to that of the ocean, in size, richness, and color.