Part 9

The California canned salmon is undoubtedly one of the greatest successes in canning. By keeping a few cans in the house, one is always ready in any emergency to produce a fine dish of salmon in a few minutes. It is particularly nice for a breakfast-dish, heated, seasoned with pepper and salt, placed on thin slices of buttered toast, with a cream dressing poured over all, _i. e._, milk thickened on the fire, by stirring it into a _roux_ (see page 51) of butter and flour, and seasoned with pepper, salt, and a few pieces of fresh butter just before serving. For dinner it is excellent served with any of the fish sauces. Salmon is also nice served in shells, as for trout (see page 109).

SHAD.

This delicious fish is undoubtedly best broiled, with a _maître-d’hôtel_ sauce; but it is good also cut in slices, and _sautéd_.

TROUT.

If large, they may be broiled, boiled, or baked. If boiled or broiled, serve the _sauce Hollandaise_ with them. Professional cooks generally boil it in the _court bouillon_. Smaller trout are better egged, rolled in salted corn-meal, and thrown into boiling lard.

The trout is a very nice fish for an _au gratin_, or stewed, called then _en matelote_.

TROUT IN CASES OR IN SHELLS (_en Coquilles_).

Parboil little trout; cut the fish into pieces about an inch long, or into dice; place them in paper cases (which have been buttered or oiled, and placed in the oven a few moments to harden the paper so as to enable it to hold the sauce). After partly filling the cases with the pieces of fish, pour over them some fine herb sauce (see page 128), and sprinkle over bread-crumbs; put them into the oven twenty minutes before dinner to bake.

If shells are used, little plated-silver ones (scallop shells) are preferable. In that case, it would be better to fry the fish (seasoned with pepper, salt, and a little lemon-juice) in a _sauté_ pan; cut them in dice afterward, and put them in the shells; pour over a fine herb or a Bechamel sauce; strew the top with grated bread-crumbs; place them a few moments in the oven to brown the tops, and serve.

COD-FISH.

Fresh cod-fish is better boiled. The fish is so large that it is generally boiled in slices. After it is well salted, horse-radish and vinegar in the boiling water will improve the fish. Oyster-sauce is the favorite sauce for a boiled cod-fish. Capers might be mixed with the oyster-sauce. Some serve the fish with the sauce poured over it. Any of the fish sauces may be served with fresh cod-fish. These slices may also be broiled and served with a _maître-d’hôtel_ sauce, or they may be egged and bread-crumbed, and fried in boiling lard.

CRIMPED COD-FISH (_Rudmanii_).

Soak two slices of cod-fish one inch thick for two hours in ice-water; put them into the stew-pan, and, pouring over enough salted boiling water to cover them, let them _simmer_ for about ten minutes; place them neatly on a platter on a folded napkin, garnish with parsley, and pour into the two cavities a _Tartare_ or a pickle sauce.

SALT COD-FISH.

Soak this in water overnight; parboil it, changing the water once or twice; separate the flakes. Serve them on thin slices of toast, with an egg sauce poured over. Or,

Mince it when boiled in very little water, which should be changed once; thicken it with butter and flour mixed; cook about two minutes, then break in several eggs. When the eggs are cooked and mixed with the fish, pour all on thin slices of buttered toast.

COD-FISH BALLS.

Cut the cod-fish in pieces; soak them about an hour in lukewarm water, when the bones and skin may be easily removed; pull the fish then into fine shreds, and put it on the stove in some cold water. As soon as it begins to boil, change the water, and repeat this process a second time. It is not proper to boil it, as it renders it tough. As soon as the fish is ready, some potatoes must be cooked at the same time, _i. e._, boiled tender, and well-mashed while still hot, with a little butter added. Mix half as much cod-fish as potatoes while both are _still hot_. Form them into little balls or thick flat cakes. Fry them in a little hot butter in a _sauté_ pan, or immerse them in boiling-hot lard. It makes all the difference in the flavor of the balls if the fish and potatoes are mixed while both are _hot_. Of course, they are better fried at once, but may be made the night before serving (at breakfast), if they are only properly _mixed_.

FISH CHOWDER.

Cut three pounds of any kind of fresh fish (cod-fish is especially good), one and a half pounds of potatoes, and one large onion (three ounces) into slices; also, half a pound of salt pork into half-inch squares or dice.

Put the pork and onions into a saucepan, and fry them a light brown; then add a cupful of claret; and when it boils take it from the fire.

Butter a large stew-pan, and put in first a layer of potatoes, then a layer of fish, then a sprinkle of onions and pork (strained from the claret), pepper and salt, and continue these alternations until it is all in, having the potatoes on top. Now pour the claret over the top, and barely cover the whole with boiling water. Cover closely, and let it simmer for fifteen minutes without disturbing it.

In the mean time, bring a pint of milk (or, better, cream) to a boil, take it from the fire, and cut into it three ounces of butter, and break in three ship-crackers. Arrange the slices of fish and potatoes in the shape of a dome in the centre of a hot platter. Place the softened crackers (skimmed from the milk) over the top, and pour over the milk. Serve very hot.

SMALL PAN-FISH (_Perch, Sun-fish, etc._).

They are generally preferred peppered, salted, then rolled in salted corn-meal, and fried either in a _sauté_ pan with a little lard and some slices of pork, or in boiling lard. They make also a good stew _en matelote_, or a good _au gratin_. Their chief excellence consists in their being perfectly fresh, and served hot.

MACKEREL

should be broiled, and served _à la maître-d’hôtel_.

SMELTS

are good salted, peppered, and rolled in salted corn-meal or flour, and fried in boiling-hot lard, but better egged and bread-crumbed before frying. They should be served _immediately_, or they will lose their crispness and flavor. When served as a garnish for a large fish, they should be fried in the shape of rings. This is easily done by putting the tail of the fish into its mouth, and holding it with a pin. After it is fried, the pin is withdrawn, as the fried fish will hold its shape. Place these rings around the fish, with an additional garnish of parsley and lemon slices; or the rings may be served alone in a circle around the side of a platter, with a tomato or a _Tartare_ sauce in the centre.

There can be no prettier manner of serving them alone than one often seen in Paris. They are fried in the usual manner; then a little silver or silver-plated skewer four inches long is drawn through two or three of the smelts, running it carefully through the eyes. One skewerful, with a slice of lemon on top, is served for each person at table. If the silver-plated skewers are too extravagant, little ones of polished wire will answer.

FRIED SLICES OF FISH, WITH TOMATO SAUCE (_Fish à l’Orlay_).

Bone and skin the fish, and cut it into even slices; or if a flounder or any flat fish is used, begin at the tail, and, keeping the knife close to the bone, separate each side of the fish neatly from it; then cut each side in two, lengthwise, leaving the fish in four long pieces. Remove the skin carefully. After having sprinkled pepper and salt over them, roll each piece first in sifted cracker or bread crumbs, then in half a cupful of milk mixed with an egg, and then in the crumbs again. They are better fried in a _sauté_ pan in a little hot butter; yet they may be _sautéd_ in a little hot lard, with some neat slices of pork, or fried in boiling lard.

Pour tomato sauce No. 2 (see page 125) on a hot platter, arrange the pieces of fish symmetrically on it, and serve immediately.

TO FRY EELS.

Skin them, cut them into four-inch lengths, season them with salt and pepper, roll them in flour or salted corn-meal, and fry them in boiling lard. Some parboil eels and bull-heads, saying it removes a muddy taste. I do not think it is necessary. Fried eels are generally served with a tomato, a pickle, or a _Tartare_ sauce.

EELS STEWED (_London Cooking-school_).

Put three-quarters of a cupful of butter into a stew-pan; when hot, add four small onions minced fine, which cook to a light-brown color; add then a table-spoonful of flour; when well mixed and cooked, add two cupfuls of stock, a wine-glassful of port-wine, and two bay leaves (the bay leaves may be omitted). Now put in the eels (two small ones or one large one), cut into pieces one inch long. Cover tightly.

They will be ready to send to the table in about fifteen minutes, served on a hot platter, with a circle around them of toasted or fried slices of bread (_croûtons_), cut diamond-shaped.

SHELL-FISH.

OYSTERS.

RAW OYSTERS.

Drain them well in a colander, marinate them, _i. e._, sprinkle over plenty of pepper and salt, and let them remain in a cold place for at least half an hour before serving. This makes a great difference in their flavor. They may be served in the half-shell with quarters or halves of lemons in the same dish. I think a prettier arrangement is to serve them in a block of ice. Select a ten-pound block; melt with a hot flat-iron a symmetrical-shaped cavity in the top to hold the oysters; chip also from the sides at the base, so that the ice-block may stand in a large platter on the napkin. When the oysters are well salted and peppered, place them in the ice, and let them remain in some place where the ice will not melt until the time of serving. The salt will help to make the oysters very cold. The ice may be decorated with leaves or smilax vines, and a row of lemon quarters or halves may be placed around the platter at the base of the ice. It has an especially pretty effect served on a table by gas-light. The English often serve little thin squares of buttered brown bread (like Boston brown bread) with oysters.

FRIED OYSTERS.

Drain the oysters in the colander; sprinkle over pepper and salt, which mix well with them, and put them in a cold place for fifteen or twenty minutes before cooking. This is marinating them. When ready to cook, roll each one first in sifted cracker-crumbs, then in beaten egg mixed with a little milk and seasoned with pepper and salt, then in the cracker-crumbs again. You will please remember the routine: _first_, the crumbs before the egg, as the egg will not adhere well to the oyster without the crumbs; now throw them into boiling-hot lard (as you would fry doughnuts), first testing to see if it is hot enough. As soon as they assume a light-brown color they should be drained, and served immediately on a hot platter.

Oysters should not be fried until the persons at table are ready to eat them, as it takes only a few moments to fry them, and they are not good unless very hot.

The platter of oysters may be garnished with a table-spoonful of chopped pickles or chowchow placed at the four opposite sides; or the oysters may be served as a border around cold slaw (see receipt, page 224), when they are an especially nice course for dinner; or they may be served with celery, either plain or in salad. As the platter for the fried oysters is hot, the celery salad or cold slaw might be piled on a folded napkin in the centre.

SCALLOPED OYSTERS IN SHELLS.

They may be served cooked in their shells, or in silver scallop shells, when they present a better appearance than when cooked and served all in one dish.

If cooked in an oyster or clam shell, one large, or two or three little oysters are placed in it, with a few drops of the oyster liquor. It is sprinkled with pepper and salt, and cracker or bread crumbs. Little pieces of butter are placed over the top. When all are ready, they are put into the oven. When they are plump and hot, they are done. Brown the tops with a salamander, or with a red-hot kitchen shovel.

If they are cooked in the silver scallop shells, which are larger, several oysters are served in the one shell; one or two are put in, peppered, salted, strewed with cracker-crumbs and small pieces of butter; then more layers, until the shell is full, or until enough are used for one person. Moisten them with the oyster-juice, and strew little pieces of butter over the top. They are merely kept in the oven until they are thoroughly hot, then browned with a salamander. Serve one shell for each person at table, placed on a small plate. The oysters may be bearded or not.

SCALLOPED OYSTERS.

Ingredients: Three dozen oysters, a large tea-cupful of bread or cracker crumbs, two ounces of fresh butter, pepper and salt, half a tea-cupful of oyster-juice.

Make layers of these ingredients, as described in the last article, in the top of a chafing-dish, or in any kind of pudding or _gratin_ dish; bake in a quick oven about fifteen minutes; brown with a salamander.

OYSTER STEW.

Put a quart of oysters on the fire in their own liquor. The moment they _begin_ to boil, skim them out, and add to the liquor a half-pint of hot cream, salt, and Cayenne pepper to taste. Skim it well, take it off the fire, add to the oysters an ounce and a half of butter broken into small pieces. Serve immediately.

OYSTER SOUP (see page 93).

OYSTER OR CLAM FRITTERS.

Oysters served on buttered toast for breakfast, or in _vols-au-vent_, silver scallop-shells, or in paper boxes, are very nice made after the receipts on page 241. They or the fricasseed oysters may be served in either of the above ways.

FRICASSEE OF OYSTERS (_Oysters à la Boulette_).

Put one quart, or twenty-five, oysters on the fire in their own liquor. The moment it begins to boil, turn it into a hot dish through a colander, leaving the oysters in the colander. Put into the saucepan two ounces of butter (size of an egg), and when it bubbles sprinkle in one ounce (a table-spoonful) of sifted flour; let it cook a minute without taking color, stirring it well with a wire egg-whisk; then add, mixing well, a cupful of the oyster liquor. Take it from the fire and mix in the yolks of two eggs, a little salt, a very little Cayenne pepper, one tea-spoonful of lemon-juice, and one grating of nutmeg. Beat it well; then return it to the fire to set the eggs, without allowing it to boil. Put in the oysters.

These oysters may be served on thin slices of toast for breakfast or tea, or in papers (_en papillote_), or as a filling for patties for dinner.

TO ROAST CANNED OYSTERS.

Drain them. Put them in a spider which is very hot; turn them in a moment, so that they may cook on both sides. It only takes a few seconds to cook them. Put them on a hot plate in which there are pepper, salt, and a little hot melted butter. They should be served immediately. They have the flavor of the oyster roasted in the shell.

Some cook them in this manner at table on a chafing-dish by means of the spirit-lamp.

SPICED OYSTERS (_Miss Lestlie_).

Ingredients: Two hundred oysters, one pint of vinegar, a nutmeg grated, eight blades of whole mace, three dozen whole cloves, one tea-spoonful of salt, two tea-spoonfuls of whole allspice, and as much Cayenne pepper as will lie on the point of a knife.

Put the oysters with their liquor into a large earthen vessel; add to them the vinegar and all the other ingredients. Stir all well together and set them over a slow fire, keeping them covered. Stir them to the bottom several times. As soon as they are well scalded, they are done. To be eaten cold.

CLAMS.

CLAMS COOKED WITH CREAM (_Mrs. Audenreid_).

Chop fifty small clams not too fine, and season them with pepper and salt. Put into a stew-pan butter the size of an egg, and when it bubbles sprinkle in a tea-spoonful of flour, which cook a few moments; stir gradually into it the clam liquor, then the clams, which stew about two or three minutes; then add a cupful of boiling cream, and serve immediately. The clams may or may not be bearded.

CLAM CHOWDER.

Put fifty clams on the fire in their own liquor, with a little salt. When they have boiled about three minutes, strain them, and return the liquor to the fire. Chop a medium-sized onion (two ounces) into small pieces, and cut six ounces of pork into dice. Fry both a light color in two ounces (size of an egg) of butter; then stir in three ounces of flour (two table-spoonfuls). When thoroughly cooked, add the clam liquor, half a pint of good stock or milk, the same quantity of cream, a salt-spoonful of mace, a salt-spoonful of thyme, salt to taste, and eight ounces of potatoes cut into dice. When these are cooked, and the chowder is about to be sent to table, add the clams cut in dice, and four ounces of ship-bread or crackers broken in pieces.

TUNISON CLAM CHOWDER.

Ingredients: Two hundred soft clams, one large onion, twenty large crackers, can of tomatoes, parsley (chopped fine), half a pound of butter, one large tea-spoonful of sweet marjoram, thyme, sage, savory, half a tea-spoonful of ground cloves, and half a tea-spoonful of curry.

Boil well; then add half a pint of milk and half a pint of sherry wine.

CLAM FRITTERS (see page 230).

CLAM SOUP (see page 93).

CRABS AND LOBSTERS.

SOFT-SHELL CRABS.

Dry them; sprinkle them with pepper and salt; roll them, first in flour, then in egg (half a cupful of milk mixed in one egg), then in cracker-dust, and fry them in boiling lard.

DEVILED CRAB.

When the crabs are boiled, take out the meat and cut it into small pieces (dice); clean well the shells.

To six ounces of crab meat, mix two ounces of bread-crumbs, two hard-boiled eggs chopped, the juice of half a lemon, Cayenne pepper and salt. Mix all with cream or cream sauce, or, what is still better, a Bechamel sauce (see page 127). Fill the shells with the mixture, smooth the tops, sprinkle over sifted bread-crumbs, and color it in a quick oven.

DEVILED LOBSTER

is made in the same way as deviled crab, merely substituting the lobster for the crab, and adding a grating of nutmeg to the seasoning. In boiling lobsters and crabs, they are sufficiently cooked when they assume a bright-red color. Too much boiling renders them tough.

LOBSTER CHOPS.

Cut half a pound of the flesh of a boiled lobster into small dice. Put two ounces of butter into a stew-pan, and when it bubbles sprinkle in two ounces of flour (one table-spoonful). Cook it; then pour in a cupful of boiling cream and the lobster dice. Stir it until it is scalding hot; then take it from the fire, and, when slightly cooled, stir in the beaten yolks of three eggs, a grating of nutmeg, a little Cayenne pepper, and salt to taste. Return the mixture to the fire, and stir it long enough to well set the eggs.

Butter a platter, on which spread the lobster mixture half an inch deep. When cold, form it into the shape of chops, pointed at one end; bread-crumb, egg, and crumb them again, and fry them in boiling lard. Stick a claw into the end of each lobster chop after it is cooked.

Place the chops in a circle, overlapping each other, on a napkin. Decorate the dish by putting the tail of the lobster in the centre, and its head, with the long horns, on the tail. Around the outside of the circle of chops arrange the legs, cut an inch each side of the middle joints, so that they will form two equal sides of a triangle.

A GOOD WAY TO PREPARE A LOBSTER.

Put into a saucepan butter the size of a small egg, and a tea-spoonful of minced onion. When it has cooked, sprinkle in a tea-spoonful of flour, which cook also; then stir in one cupful of the water in which the lobster was boiled, one cupful of milk, one cupful of strong veal or beef stock, pepper, and salt: add the meat of the boiled lobster, and when quite hot pour all in the centre of a hot platter. Decorate the dish with the lobster’s head in the centre, fried-bread diamonds (_croûtons_) around the outside; or in any prettier way you choose, with the abundant resources of lobster legs and trimmings.

FROGS.

Frogs are such a delicacy that it is a pity not to prepare them with care.

The hind legs only are used. They may be made into a broth the same as chicken broth, and are considered a very advantageous diet for those suffering with pulmonary affections.

FROGS FRIED.

Put them in salted boiling water, with a little lemon-juice, and boil them three minutes; wipe them; dip them first in cracker-dust, then in eggs (half a cupful of milk mixed in two eggs and seasoned with pepper and salt), then again in cracker-crumbs. When they are all breaded, clean off the bone at the end with a dry cloth. Put them in a wire basket and dip them in boiling lard, to fry. Put a little paper (see page 61) on the end of each bone; place them on a hot platter, in the form of a circle, one overlapping the other, with French pease in the centre. Serve immediately, while they are still crisp and hot.

SAUCES.

The French say the English only know how to make one kind of sauce, and a poor one at that. Notwithstanding the French understand the sauce question, it is very convenient to make the drawn butter, and, by adding different flavorings, make just so many kinds of sauce. For instance, by adding capers, shrimps, chopped pickles, anchovy paste, chopped boiled eggs, lobster, oysters, parsley, cauliflower, etc., one has caper, shrimp, pickle, anchovy, egg, and the other sauces. The drawn-butter sauce is simple, yet few make it properly, managing generally to have it insipid, and with flour uncooked. If a housekeeper has any pride about having a good table, she will be amply repaid for learning some of the French sauces, which are, at last, simple enough. We are often frightened to see many items in a receipt; we shake our heads dubiously at the trouble and extravagance of one receipt mentioning thyme, nutmeg, bay-leaf, mace, shallot, capers, pepper-corns, parsley, and, last of all the horrors, stock. As far as the herbs are concerned, an investment of twenty-five cents will purchase enough mace, thyme, bay-leaves, and pepper-corns for a year’s supply of abundant sauces, to say nothing of their uses for braising, _blanquettes_, etc. Five cents’ worth of shallots should last a long time; they are sold in all city markets, being only young forced onions. Capers would be extravagant if a bottleful, costing sixty cents, would not last a year in a small-sized family. I have already said enough about stock to show that one must be very incompetent if a little of it can not be at hand, made of trimmings and cheap pieces of meat and bones.

The use of mushrooms and truffles, which are comparatively cheap in France, can not be extensively introduced here. A little tin can, holding about a gill of tasteless truffles, costs three or four dollars: however, mushrooms are much less expensive, and infinitely better. A can of mushrooms costs forty cents, and is sufficient for several sauces and _entrées_.

Some persons raise mushrooms in their cellars. A small, rich bed in a dark place where the soil will not freeze, planted with mushroom spawn, will yield enough mushrooms for the family, and the neighbors besides, with very little trouble and expense.

The French white sauces differ from the English white sauce, as they are made with strong white stock, prepared with veal, or chickens, or both, and some vegetables for a basis. If one would learn to make the _sauce Bechamel_, it will be found an easy affair to prepare many delicious _entrées_, such as chicken in shells (_en coquille_), or in papers (_en papillote_), and mushrooms in crust (_croûte aux champignons_).

For boiled fish the _sauce Hollandaise_ is a decided success. In Paris every one speaks of this delicious sauce, and bribes the _chef de cuisine_ for the receipt. It is made without stock, and is very simple.