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Fish Croquettes
Take any kind of boiled fish, remove all the bones, chop fine, with little parsley, season with pepper and salt; make a little batter of flour and egg, also little milk; make into balls, roll into egg and cracker crumbs. Fry a pretty brown. Serve with a mayonnaise, or any sauce preferred.
A leftovers recipe with no quantities at all, which is how most croquette entries of the period read. The proportions are yours to judge, and the judgement that matters is how wet the mixture is.
- ProportionsRoughly 2 cups flaked cooked fish to 1 beaten egg and 2-3 tablespoons flour, with milk added a spoonful at a time. The mass should just hold a shape when pressed; wetter than that and the croquettes burst in the fat.
- "A little batter"This is a binder, not a coating batter. It goes into the fish mixture; the separate egg-and-crumb layer named later is the outer crust.
- Cracker crumbsThese were usually plain soda or water crackers, crushed fine. Unseasoned dry breadcrumbs are the closest substitute; panko gives a coarser crust. If the crackers you use are salted, ease back on the added salt.
- Chill before fryingThe original skips it, but half an hour in the refrigerator after shaping firms the binder and is the single best defence against croquettes falling apart in the pan.
- "Fry a pretty brown"Deep fat at 360-375F, two to three minutes, turning if shallow-frying. Everything inside is already cooked, so the aim is colour and a set crust, nothing more.
- Fish choiceCod, haddock, salmon and leftover boiled halibut all work. Avoid oily fish that has been refrigerated several days, and pick over carefully for pin bones since the chopping will not reveal them.
- YieldTwo cups of fish gives about eight to ten croquettes, enough for four as a light main course.
Croquettes earned their own chapter in many American household cookbooks because they solved a standing problem: what to do with the remains of a boiled fish or a joint of meat in a kitchen with no reliable cold storage. The name comes from the French croquer, to crunch, and the form arrived in English-language cookery through the French professional tradition, but the domestic version quickly became a thrift dish rather than a restaurant one. The vagueness here is deliberate and typical of the genre — "any kind of boiled fish" and "any sauce preferred" assume a cook who already knows what a croquette should feel like in the hand and needs only reminding of the sequence. The recommendation of mayonnaise alongside points to a sauce made at home, a standard cookbook preparation of the period.