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Cod, Fried (Tail end of the cod is best)
The tail end of the cod is best cooked in this manner, as it is not much esteemed when boiled. Steaks may be cut from the middle and served in this way also. Cut the fish into slices rather more than an inch thick, wash them well and dry them thoroughly in a clean cloth. Roll them in flour, and sprinkle a little salt and grated nutmeg over them. Plunge them into boiling lard, and fry them till they are lightly browned on both sides, and the flesh parts easily from the bone. Put them on a piece of clean blotting paper to clear them from fat; serve them on a hot napkin, and send them to table garnished with parsley and accompanied with melted butter or anchovy sauce. Time, about a quarter of an hour. Probable cost of cod, 8d. per pound, when plentiful. Sufficient, three pounds for four or five persons.
A straightforward deep-fry of thick cod steaks, with a few Victorian habits worth translating.
- Dry the fish properlyThis is the hinge. Cod holds a great deal of water, and wet steaks will steam rather than brown and will spit violently in the fat. Pat dry, then let them sit uncovered on a rack for a few minutes before flouring.
- "Boiling lard"Lard does not boil; the phrase means fat hot enough to bubble furiously when the fish goes in, roughly 340-360F. Below that the coating soaks; much above it the flour scorches before the bone releases. Any neutral high-smoke-point oil works if lard is not to hand.
- Fifteen minutes is for thick steaksFifteen minutes is generous -- The recipe's own slices are "rather more than an inch thick", and a quarter of an hour allows for both sides and for frying in batches; a modern cook at that thickness would expect rather less. The test given in the recipe is the reliable one: the flesh should part from the bone without resistance.
- Blotting paperVictorian blotting paper was unsized and untreated, so it was the household's paper towel. Use paper towels or, better, a wire rack so the underside stays crisp.
- The hot napkinA folded linen napkin on the serving dish absorbed the last of the fat. A warmed platter lined with paper does the same job and looks less alarming.
- Nutmeg with fishNot a misprint. Grated nutmeg was commonly used with cod and other white fish in nineteenth-century English cookery. Keep it very light, a few scrapes over three pounds.
- Melted butterIn a book of this date this means a flour-thickened butter sauce, not simply melted butter. Anchovy sauce is the same base with anchovy essence stirred in.
- YieldThree pounds of steaks for four or five, as stated, which is generous by modern portions; six to eight ounces per person is closer to current practice.
Cod was among the cheapest reliable sea fish in Victorian Britain, landed in quantity from the North Sea and moved inland by rail and ice, which is part of why a book of this date can quote a price per pound at all. The book's frankness about the tail end is telling: the thick middle cut commanded the price, while the thin tail, by the book's own account not much esteemed when boiled, was floured and fried. The accompanying anchovy sauce reflects the same period's fondness for reinforcing mild fish with a salted, fermented note, a habit that runs from Roman garum through eighteenth-century catsups to the bottled essences a late-Victorian kitchen kept on the shelf.