The spirit of cookery

For boiling, select large and thick fish, such as Torbay or Silver Pits, and crimp or score it before immersion in salt water. When it is trimmed, rub it over with lemon-juice to keep it white, and boil it in well-salted or sea water. If you desire to have it well flavoured, put into the salt-water roots, rhizomes, and spices ; send it to table with either butter, shrimp, Dutch, or lobster sauce. For frying, the trimmed sole must be dried by being kept wrapped in a dry cloth for an hour. Dredge it with wheatflour or oatmeal, paint it with beaten egg, and crumb it with perfectly dry breadcrumb or biscuit-powder. A large pair of soles will take the fourth part of a quartern loaf made into crumb so called, i.e., powder. Moist crumb spoils every attempt at good frying. Sole is a good object for testing the accomplishment of a cook in the matter of fritnre, the philosophy of which we have discussed in an early chapter. Drying, dredging, egging, crumbing, must all be done evenly and equally all over the fish, in default of which PREPARATIONS OF SOLE, PLAICE, FLOUNDER 527 the frying itself will be uneven, and therefore inartistic ; if the fat be not hot, the ‘ surprise ’ will not take place, and the piebald, sodden fish will be an object of pity rather than of gustatory desire. There are a number of other precautions to be observed in the frying of sole, which mostly follow out of the general rules. When the sole is fried, protect it from moisture, which makes it sodden, and thus destroys the main feature of a friture, namely, its crispness. Fried Sole admits of various kinds of secondary treatment ; it will keep good in a dry larder for several days ; it may be boned or filleted, and warmed in a Dutch oven gradually or immersed in various sauces. Sole au Gratin is an excellent preparation, particularly with mushrooms, and depends for its taste just as much as a roast upon the browned outside and the concentrated gravy. Several variations are pleasing, such as that with brown Italian Sauce, or that d la Mode de Trouville, which latter, however, must be kept modest in the matter of onions and cider. Sole ait Four is stuffed and baked in the oven. Next come the Fillets of Sole, collared, in white sauce, with capers ; fried ; in forcemeat au gratin ; braised ; scored and broiled; Normandy matelote of soles; the same with tomatoes a I’Americaine ; d la Orly (or Horly), and many special adaptations termed after places, such as d la Venitienne, Provengale, Dieppoise, Bouennaise, etc., mostly without specificity. Filets in aspic, as salad, and in mayonnaise, are excellent cold dishes. Plaice, French plie, when quite fresh admits of some preparations like sole, but does not bear braising or gratinating without becoming pulpy. It is best filleted and fried, and requires some spice and a good sauce to become an agreeable fare. Flounder, French carrelet, is still more perishable than plaice. Boiled fresh it makes good souchets (souchets). 52S Halibut is a flat fish which attains large dimensions, and is sold in slices by the pound ; it may be boiled, baked, fried, or cooked gently in oil. Similar remarks apply to the skate, syn. onaid, or ray (French raie) ; some appreciate the fin part, which becomes gelatinous by boiling. The dab (French limande) is rarely met with in England ; it should be treated like plaice.