Pan-Fish
Place in pan with heads together, and fill spaces with smaller fish; when ready to turn, put a plate over, drain off fat, invert pan, and the fish will be left unbroken on the plate. Put the lard back in the pan, and when hot, slip back the fish, and when the other side is brown, drain, turn on plate as before, and slide them on the platter to go to the table. This improves the appearance, if not the flavor. The heads should be left on, and the shape preserved as fully as possible.
This is less a recipe than a plating technique: how to fry a pan of small whole fish and get them to the table intact. The instructions assume a heavy skillet, rendered lard, and a cook who has already cleaned and dredged the fish.
- What "pan-fish" meansNot a method but a category: fish small enough to be fried whole in a skillet, which inland households often caught themselves — perch, bluegill, crappie, small bass, sunfish, bullheads. They are only a few inches long, so allow more than one per person depending on size.
- The step that mattersDraining the fat off before you invert the pan is the whole trick. Fish this small have almost no structure once cooked; lifting them individually with a turner tears them. Tipping the pan onto a plate while it still holds hot lard is also how people get burned, so pour the fat into a heatproof container first.
- The missing coatingThe entry assumes a coating without naming one; period fish entries typically call for rolling in flour or corn meal. Cornmeal, or cornmeal cut with flour, seasoned with salt and pepper, is the period-appropriate choice and gives the crust enough body to survive the flip.
- FatLard is what the book means and it still works well — high smoke point, clean flavor. Depth of about a quarter inch in the pan. Any neutral oil with a high smoke point substitutes directly.
- Heat and timingNo times are given. Medium-high heat, roughly 3 to 4 minutes a side for a 6-inch fish; the flesh at the thickest point should reach 145°F and pull cleanly from the backbone. Small fish overcook fast, so judge by the crust color rather than the clock.
- Pan choiceA well-seasoned cast-iron or carbon steel skillet, and one large enough to hold the fish in a single layer without crowding. Nonstick makes the inversion easier but browns the cornmeal less.
- Heads onThe book gives the heads-on instruction as a matter of appearance and of preserving the shape; leaving them on may also help the fish hold together. If that is unwelcome at the table, expect more breakage and plan on serving from the pan.
Pan-fish were the fish of people who did not buy fish. In the Ohio Valley of the 1870s and 80s, when Buckeye Cookery was compiled, sea fish reached inland towns salted, smoked or packed in ice; what appeared fresh on a midwestern table generally came out of a nearby river, creek or farm pond in the hands of a family member. The word "panfish" is American and describes exactly that: a fish too small to fillet, sized to fit a skillet whole. The entry's concern with appearance — heads together, spaces filled with the smaller ones, the finished fish slid onto a platter unbroken — reflects the book's larger project of teaching plain, thrifty households to set a table that looked considered. The aside that this "improves the appearance, if not the flavor," is characteristic of the volume's dry practicality.