The Cook Book, by "Oscar" of the Waldorf

Scale and clean a pike, cut it into slices and place itin a bakingdish; put in some slices of onion, two bay leaves, a piece of butter, some pepper and salt, and one-half pint of sour cream. Bake it for twenty-five minutes in a brisk oven, basting often with the cream. Strew some breadcrumbs and grated Parmesan cheese over the fish, and brown it under a salamander. Place the slices of fish on a hot dish, pour some broth in the baking dish, add some lemon juice, salt and pepper, stir it for a minute or two on the fire, then pour it over the fish and serve. Boiled Pike, Dubois. Select a gold-coated pike weighing six or seven pounds, scale and draw it, truss the head and wash it well. Make incisions across the back as deep as the spine bone, place the fish on its belly in the fishkettle, cover with white wine and water mixed in equal quantities, add a few minced vegetables, a bunch of sweet herbs and parsley, four or five peppercorns and a little salt, bring to a boil and simmer over a slow fire for an hour. Prepare a good sauce with one pint of fish sauce strained and cooled, thicken it with flour and butter kneaded together, add two tablespoonfuls of soy and five tablespoonfuls of butter broken into small pieces. Drain the fish, place it on a folded napkin on a hot dish, or an ornamental dish-paper, garnish with nice little sprigs of fresh parsley and serve with the sauce in a sauceboat. Boiled Pike with Caper Sauce. A pike will improve by being kept for two days; clean it, cut off the fins and bind its head round with a string. Put the fish in a fishkettle, cover with court bouillon, and let it simmer for forty minutes, then leave it to soak in the court bouillon for twenty-four hours. Before warming the pike again take it and the liquor out and clean the kettle, then put it back again and warm it for twenty minutes. Place the fish on a folded napkin or ornamental dish-paper on a hot dish, garnish round with fried parsley and serve with a sauceboatful of caper sauce. Fried Fillets of Pike. Cut the fillets carefully off a pike, wash and dry them well, then dip them in beaten egg and breadcrumbs and fry in plenty of oil. When nicely browned drain the fillets, arrange them in a circle on a hot dish, fill the center with matelote sauce and serve. Pike Financiere. Clean and skin a pike, wrap it in buttered paper and boil in mirepoix and French wine mixed in equal quantities. Make a garnishing of pike forcemeat quenelles, mushrooms, crayfish tails and truffles mixed in financiere sauce, prepared as for fish. Put a rice socle on a hot dish, drain and glaze the pike and put it in the socle, pile the garnishing round it in such a way that it hides the socle, garnish round with truffles, mushrooms and crayfish. Trim four silver skewers with crayfish, mushrooms and fried smelts, stick them in the fish and serve with a sauceboatful of the same sauce. Fried Pike. Select small pike, draw and wash them; put a lump of butter in a stewpan and when blue smoke arises put in the fish, seeing that they are perfectly dry, and fry till nicely browned and crisp. Afterward drain the butter off them and put in with them two or three anchovies, a slice of ginger, a little grated nutmeg, salt to taste, and a sufficient quantity of claret to cover them. Boil the fish until tender, vhen the liquor should be reduced to half its original quantity; then add the juice of an orange and a small lump of batter. Lay the fish on a hot dish, pour the sauce over, garnish with slices of oranges, and serve. Pickled Pike.