Common Sense in the Household: A Manual of Practical Housewifery. Marion Harland
the beauty with gentle respect while cleaning, washing, and wiping him, and lay him at full length, still respectfully, in a baking-pan, with just enough water to keep him from scorching. If large, score the back-bone with a sharp knife, taking care not to mar the comeliness of his red-spotted sides. Bake slowly, basting often with butter and water. By the time he is done—and he should be so well-looked after that his royal robe hardly shows a seam or rent, and the red spots are still distinctly visible—have ready in a saucepan a cup of cream—diluted with a few spoonfuls of hot water, lest it should clot in heating—in which have been stirred cautiously two tablespoonfuls of melted butter and a little chopped parsley. Heat this in a vessel set within another of boiling water, add the gravy from the dripping-pan, boil up once to thicken, and when the trout is laid—always respectfully—in a hot dish, pour the sauce around him as he lies in state. He will take kindly to the creamy bath, and your guests will take kindly to him. Garnish with a wreath of crimson nasturtium blooms and dainty sprigs of parsley, arranged by your own hands on the edge of the dish, and let no sharply-spiced sauces come near him. They would but mar his native richness—the flavor he brought with him from the lake and wild-wood. Salt him lightly, should he need it, eat and be happy.
If the above savor of bathos rather than “common sense,” my excuse is, I have lately eaten baked salmon-trout with cream-gravy.
Boiled Salmon-Trout. ✠
Clean, wash, and dry the trout; envelop in a thin cloth fitted neatly to the shape of the fish, lay within a fish-kettle, cover with salted water (cold), and boil gently half an hour or longer, according to the size. When done, unwrap and lay in a hot dish. Pour around it cream-sauce made as for baked salmon-trout—only, of course, with the omission of the fish-gravy—and serve.
Fried Trout.
Brook trout are generally cooked in this way, and form a rarely delightful breakfast or supper dish.
Clean, wash, and dry the fish, roll lightly in flour, and fry in butter or clarified dripping, or butter and lard. Let the fat be hot, fry quickly to a delicate brown, and take up the instant they are done. Lay for an instant upon a hot folded napkin, to absorb whatever grease may cling to their speckled sides; then range side by side in a heated dish, garnish, and send to the table. Use no seasoning except salt, and that only when the fish are fried in lard or unsalted dripping.
Fried Pickerel. ✠
The pickerel ranks next to trout among game-fish, and should be fried in the same manner. Especially—and I urge this with groaning of spirit, in remembrance of the many times in which I have had my sense of fitness, not to say my appetite, outraged by seeing the gallant fish brought to table dried to a crisp throughout, all his juices wasted and sweetness utterly departed—especially, do not fry him slowly and too long; and when he is done, take him out of the grease!
Cream Pickerel. ✠
Reserve your largest pickerel—those over three pounds in weight—for baking, and proceed with them as with baked salmon-trout—cream-gravy and all. If you cannot afford cream, substitute rich milk, and thicken with rice or wheat flour. The fish are better cooked in this way than any other.
Fried Perch, and other Pan-fish.
Clean, wash, and dry the fish. Lay them in a large flat dish, salt, and dredge with flour. Have ready a frying-pan of hot dripping, lard, or butter; put in as many fish as the pan will hold without crowding, and fry to a light brown. Send up hot in a chafing-dish.
The many varieties of pan-fish—porgies, flounders, river bass, weak-fish, white-fish, etc., may be cooked in like manner. In serving, lay the head of each fish to the tail of the one next him.
Stewed Cat-fish. ✠
Skin, clean, and cut off the horribly homely heads. Sprinkle with salt, to remove any muddy taste they may have contracted from the flats or holes in which they have fed, and let them lie in a cool place for an hour or so. Then put them into a saucepan, cover with cold water, and stew very gently for from half to three-quarters of an hour, according to their size. Add a chopped shallot or button-onion, a bunch of chopped parsley, a little pepper, a large tablespoonful of butter, a tablespoonful of flour mixed to a paste with cold water; boil up once, take out the fish carefully, and lay in a deep dish. Boil up the gravy once more, and pour over the fish. Send to table in a covered dish.
Fried Cat-fish. ✠
Skin, clean, and remove the heads. Sprinkle with salt, and lay aside for an hour or more. Have ready two or three eggs beaten to a froth, and, in a flat dish, a quantity of powdered cracker. Dip the fish first in the egg, then in the cracker, and fry quickly in hot lard or dripping. Take up as quick as done.
Cat-fish Chowder.
Skin, clean, and cut off the heads. Cut the fish into pieces two inches long, and put into a pot with some fat pork cut into shreds—a pound to a dozen medium-sized fish, two chopped onions, or half a dozen shallots, a bunch of sweet herbs, and pepper. The pork will salt it sufficiently. Stew slowly for three-quarters of an hour. Then stir in a cup of milk, thickened with a tablespoonful of flour; take up a cupful of the hot liquor, and stir, a little at a time, into two well-beaten eggs. Return this to the pot, throw in half a dozen Boston or butter crackers, split in half; let all boil up once, and turn into a tureen. Pass sliced lemon or cucumber pickles, also sliced, with it. Take out the backbones of the fish before serving.
Stewed Eels. ✠
Inquire, before buying, where they were caught, and give so decided a preference to country eels as to refuse those fattened upon the offal of city wharves. Nor are the largest eels the best for eating. One weighing a pound is better for your purpose than a bulky fellow that weighs three.
Skin and clean, carefully extracting all the fat from the inside. Cut into lengths of an inch and a half; put into a saucepan, with enough cold water to cover them; throw in a little salt and chopped parsley, and stew slowly, closely covered, for at least an hour. Add, at the last, a great spoonful of butter, and a little flour wet with cold water, also pepper. Serve in a deep dish. The appearance and odor of this stew are so pleasing as often to overcome the prejudices of those who “Wouldn’t touch an eel for the world! They look like snakes!” And those who have tasted them rarely enter a second demurrer.
Fried