The Cook Book, by "Oscar" of the Waldorf

Peel and cut two medium-sized onions into thin slices and put in a stewpan with a small lump of butter and fry until lightly browned. Pour over them some white stock, judging the quantity by that of the fish ; add one ounce of butter and a sufficient quantity of curry powder ; season with salt, lemon juice, a little sugar and it small quantity of cayenne. Boil the stock for fifteen or twenty minutes, then strain it into a clean stewpan, skim and put in the fish, having carefully prepared it, and boil gently, but without breaking it. Wash and boil about half a pound of rice in water ; when cooked it should be dry and have the grains unbroken. Turn the curry out on to a hot dish, garnish with croutons of fried bread or sippets of toast, and serve very hot, with the rice separate. Fish Cutlets. Season one pint of any kind of cold cooked fish with salt, pepper and cayenne, and make it into paste with a little thick cream sauce, made quite hot. Put the paste on a dish to about half an inch in thickness, and when it is cold form it into the shapes of cutlets. Put them first into bread or cracker crumbs, then into egg and again into crumbs. Fry in a fryingpan of hot fat until brown. If lobster is used, insert a small claw at the end of each cutlet, and for other kinds of fish use a small piece of thick bone. Drain off the fat and serve. Fish Fritters. Pick free from all bones a quantity of any kind of cold cooked fish and pound it in a mortar; take a small onion, peel and pound it with the fish; season to taste with salt and pepper, and add an equal bulk of mashed potatoes, mix well together and make all into a paste with beaten egg. Spread the paste out on a board, cut it into small pieces about three inches across and fry them in boiling lard to a light brown. Fold a napkin over a hot dish and pile the fritters on it Garnish with fried parsley and serve with any kind of fish sauce. Fish, Normandy Style. Melt in a bakingdish five ounces of butter on the stove or in an oven; sift into it one dessertspoonful of chopped parsley, a very little grated nutmeg, a small quan- tity of salt and black pepper, a very little red pepper, and one tablespoonful of mushroom catsup; add five pounds of any kind of fish without skin or bone and cut in pieces about four inches long and an inch and a half wide. Pour in three tablespoonfuls of brandy and four tablespoonfuls of white wine, fit the cover on the dish, put a flour and water dough round the edge to keep the steam in and bake in a moderate oven. Serve very hot. Pickled Fish. Cut into slices the required quantity of any kind of fish, dust over well with flour and put them into a fryingpan with oil to fry. Have in a mortar two or three sprigs of mint, one fresh capsicum and salt to taste, and pound well together; pour in slowly two breakfast cupfuls of vinegar, turn the whole into a saucepan and boil for five or six minutes. Take out the fish and drain it, pour over the hot vinegar. • Serve when quite cold. ' Baked Flounders. « Take two flounders, clean and split, and take out all the small bones. Lay the fish in a buttered dish and strew over some chopped mushrooms, parsley, green onions and rasped breadcrumbs ; season with salt, pepper and a small quantity of grated nutmeg. Put a few pieces of butter on the top, and bake. Make a sufficient quantity of caper sauce, flavoring it with essence of anchovy and the juice of half a lemon. When cooked, drain the butter from the fish, pour over the sauce, and serve. Baked Flounders, Italian Style.