New England Codfish

Ingredients

• Select a whole fish
• garnish of nicely sliced beets
• garnish of nicely sliced carrots
• two eggs that have been boiled
• a tablespoonful of flour
• a coffee-cupful of boiling water
• pork scraps

Method

1. 1

   Soak the codfish in cold water overnight.

2. 2

   Wash it clean, cut off fins and tail.

3. 3

   Cook whole in a large pan over hot water for 5-6 hours.

4. 4

   Serve on a hot platter with sliced beets, carrots, pork scraps, and egg sauce made by mixing boiled eggs with a butter-flour mixture and boiling water.

Nutrition per serving

Estimated from matched ingredients across 2 servings.

As published

This recipe was extracted from The Rural cook book (1907), page 7. The excerpt below is the record exactly as published.

New England Codfish.— Select a whole fish, and put it to soak in cold water over night; in the morning wash it clean and cut off the fins and tail. Cook the fish whole; if you have not got a fish kettle place it in a large milk pan partly filled with water. Cover the pan closely and set over a kettle of hot water. It will cook very slowly in this way, say five or six hours, according to the size of the fish, but it will be done properly when ready for the table. Serve it whole, placing it, on a hot platter. Indeed, one of the essentials of a good salt fish dinner is to have everything hot, not only the fish and vegetables, but plates and dishes as well. The dish on which your fish is served must be an ample one, and around the fish you will place a garnish of nicely sliced beets and carrots. With the fish you will serve pork scraps and egg sauce and boiled potatoes. The pork should be cut into dice and fried a rich brown. To make the egg sauce, take two eggs that have been boiled 10 minutes, remove the shell, and cut into little pieces, placing them in the sauce dish. Blend a piece of butter the size of an egg with a table- spoonful of flour, and when the fish is ready to serve, pour over a coffee- cupful of boiling water, stir, and pour into the sauce dish with the egg and stir again. If the sauce is too thick, add still more boiling water. When you have not time to cook a salt fish for dinner and desire an emergency dish, try salt fish in cream prepared as follows : Shred a cupful of salt cod, or, if yon prefer, use the prepared article, place it in THE RURAL COOK BOOK. « a stewpan over the lire in cold water to cover, and let it come to a boil for a couple of minutes ; pour off the water, add to the fish one pint of sweet milk, and when this boils thicken with flour wet with milk; let it boil four or five minutes, being careful it does not scorch, and serve in a hot, deep dish. Serve pickled beets with this dish, and boiled potatoes. Cuban Codfish. — Pick into fine shreds a cupful of freshened codfish. Cut an onion into thin slices and lightly brown in a saucepan with a tablespoonful of butter. Add the fish and pour in just enough water to cover. Add a part of a chopped green pepper and a half can of to- matoes. Cover closely and simmer for an hour. If the tomatoes are very juicy, less water is required. Cream a rounded teaspoonful of but- ter and one of flour; stir into the fish until smooth and cooked; turn the mixture upon thin slices of buttered toast. Delicate Fishballs. — Boil the quantity of codfish that would be re- quired, changing the water once that it may not be too salt. While the fish is hot pick it very fine, so that it will be feathery. It cannot be done fine enough with a fork, and should be picked by hand. At the same time have hot boiled potatoes ready, mash them thoroughly and make them creamy with milk and a good-sized lump of butter. To three cup- fuls of mashed potatoes take I'/i cupful of fish; the fish should not be packed down. Beat one egg lightly and stir into the other ingredients and season to taste. Beat the mixture well together and until light, then mold it into small balls, handling lightly and before frying roll the balls in flour. Fry them in smoking hot fat until a gold color, Mexican Codfish. — Fry to a pale yellow one small onion, chopped fine, in three tablespoonfuls of butter; add two tablespoon fu Is of flour, half 3 green pepper, chopped fine, and one cupful of stewed and sifted tomato pulp. When the sauce reaches the boiling point, add half a pound of salt codfish, which has been freshened for Zi hours in cold water and slowly simmered until it will readily separate into flakes. Codfish Mound. — Make one quart of good mashed potatoes without any salt; add a pint of picked boiled codfish. Season with pepper; beat well together, make into a mound with a depression in center on a bak- isb dish, and set in the oven to brown. When brought to the table, pour a few tablespoonfuls of cream sauce in center of mound, and garnish with hard-boiled egg. Serve with boiled beets and, if desired, salt pork or bacon cut into tiny squares and fried crisp, which, with the fat fried out, is poured into a gravy bowl. This makes a hearty and satisfying Biscay Salt Cod. — Bone two pounds of salt cod and soak in cold water for 12 hours. Place in a saucepan, cover with salt water and let heat gradually to boilmg point; then add fresh water and let boil again. 18 THE RURAL COOK BOOK. Take out and drain. Chop two onions and one green pepper quite fine ;ind cook for five minutes in butter or oil. Add one sliced tomato or half-cupfui of stewed tomatoes, one clove of garlic and a small chili pepper. Add to these three pints of broth, a small bunch oi parsley, three tablespoonfuls of tomato catsup and a pint of small potatoes (peeled) or the same quantity of potato balls. Cook until the potatoes are just done, add the cod ai;d cook five minutes longer. Salt Codfish Chowder. — Cut one-fourth pound of salt pork into bits and Iry out the fat in a frying pan ; in this brown two medium-sized onions, sliced. Wash and drain a pound of codfish, cut or picked into bits; cover with cold water and set on back of range to heat, but not boil. ■ After two hours add a pint and a half of potatoes pared and sliced, and a dash of pepper. Add a cupful of water to the onions and pork and strain over the potatoes. When the potatoes are tender add one cupful each of scalded cream and milk. Pour the chowder over six crackers broken into halves and serve. Finnan Haddie, Caledonian Style.— Soak one-half of a finnan haddie weighing four pounds, two hours in milk and water to cover, using eqaal parts, having the liquid at a uniformly even tepid temperature. This is best accomplished by having the fish in a drip pan on the back of the range. Trim the fish to fit a copper platter or graniteware drip- ping pan, by cutting off fiank and a two-inch piece from the tail end. Pour over a cream sauce, and surround with six halves of potatoes of uniform size smoothly pared. Cook until the potatoes are soft, the time required being about 40 minutes, basting with the cream sauce three times during the cooking. Cream must enter into the composition of a real cream sauce. For the cream sauce for the finnan haddie, melt two tablespoonfuls of butter, add two tablespoonfuls of fiour, and stir until well blended, then pour en gradually, while stirring constantly, one cupful of milk and one-half cupful of cream. Bring to the boiling point, and season with a few grains of pepper. No salt will be needed, for it must be remenibeied that finnan haddie is salted. Finnan Haddie in Cream. — Cover a pound of the fish with cold water and let come to a simmer, drain, then cut into moderate-sized pieces. In the meantime prepare a cream sauce made by melting a tablespoonful of butter to which is added a tablespoonful of flour

Cook this with the app: pantry check, scaling, and the assistant.