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Batter for Frying Meat, Fish, Fruit, and Vegetables
To four ounces of flour add a gill of lukewarm water, a pinch of salt, and two table-spoonfuls of salad oil. Let the mixture stand awhile, and, before using, dash in the whites of two eggs whisked till firm. Probable cost, 6d.
A plain lean batter of the French pâte à frire type — no raising agent, the lift coming entirely from whisked egg white folded in at the last moment. It behaves well as long as the resting and the folding are respected.
- The hinge: fold, do not stir"Dash in" is misleading. The whisked whites should be cut and folded through the rested batter with a spatula so the air survives; beating them in collapses them and you get a heavy, bready coating.
- A gillIn a British book of this period a gill is a quarter of an imperial pint, 5 fl oz or about 142 ml — a US half-cup plus two tablespoons. If you work from American measures, 4 fl oz will give a noticeably stiffer batter; add water by the teaspoon until it coats the back of a spoon.
- Four ounces of flourAbout 115 g, a scant cup of plain flour. Weigh it if you can; scooped cup measures run heavy and this batter has no leavening to rescue it.
- Salad oilVictorian shorthand for a mild table oil, in practice usually olive, as distinct from cooking fat or dripping. Any neutral oil works; a strong extra-virgin olive oil will dominate delicate fish or fruit.
- "Let the mixture stand awhile"Thirty minutes at room temperature is enough, an hour is better. The rest hydrates the flour and relaxes the gluten worked up in mixing, which is what keeps the coating tender rather than tough.
- Frying temperatureThe book assumes you judge fat by eye. Aim for 350–375°F (175–190°C): below that the batter drinks oil, above it the crust colours before the interior sets.
- YieldEnough to coat roughly 1 lb of prepared food — fish fillets, apple rings, cauliflower florets. Pat wet items dry and dust them with flour first or the batter slides off.
- Sweet usesFor fruit the recipe stands as written; the salt is there for flavour, not seasoning. Sugar in the batter itself will scorch, so sift it over after draining.
Cassell's treats a frying batter as infrastructure: one formula serving whitebait, mutton cutlets, apple fritters and salsify alike. The construction — flour slaked with water and oil, rested, then lightened with stiff whites — resembles the French pâte à frire, which English cookery writers are often said to have absorbed steadily through the nineteenth century, and it stands apart from the older British batters bound with whole egg and milk, which fry heavier and browner. The costing of sixpence, given as a matter of course beside the recipe, points at the book's readership: households running on an accounted budget, where the housekeeper was expected to know what a dish ought to come to before she ordered the ingredients.