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Halibut Pie
Take four pounds of fresh halibut (the middle of the fish is the best for this purpose), season it with salt, pepper, cayenne, and powdered mace. Take off the skin, cut the flesh into thick slices, and put these into a pie-dish, with a quarter of a pound of fresh butter, broken into pieces, and two table-spoonfuls of anchovy sauce. Line the edges of the dish with pastry, and cover with a good crust. Bake in a good oven for one hour or more. Sufficient for six or seven persons. Probable cost of halibut, 6d. or 8d. per pound.
A plain Victorian fish pie: no sauce, no vegetables, nothing but seasoned halibut, butter and anchovy under a crust. The whole thing turns on not overcooking the fish.
- "A good oven"In modern terms roughly 400-425F (200-220C), hot enough to set and brown a covered crust. The book gives no temperatures; the ranking of slow, moderate, good and quick ovens is inference from usage, not a stated scale.
- The hour is for the crust, not the fishThick halibut slices are cooked through in 20-25 minutes at this heat, and an hour will leave them dry and cottony. Bake until the crust is set and coloured, roughly 35-40 minutes for a deep dish, and test the fish at the vent rather than trusting the clock.
- Anchovy sauceThe bottled Victorian condiment, essentially anchovy, vinegar and spice. Two teaspoons of anchovy paste loosened with a tablespoon of water, or a couple of mashed salted anchovy fillets, does the same work; the salt in it is why the seasoning of the fish should be light.
- Buy fillet, then check itFour pounds of halibut on the bone yields considerably less flesh, so buy about 2 1/2 to 3 lb of skinned fillet for six or seven. Run a finger along the slices for stray bones before they go in the dish.
- LiquidA quarter-pound of butter and the fish's own juices are the only moisture, which suits halibut's firm flesh but gives no gravy. A few spoonfuls of fish stock or cream added before the lid goes on is within the spirit of the period and keeps the underside from drying.
- MaceThe dried outer covering of nutmeg, warmer and less sweet. Ground mace is still sold; a scant half-teaspoon is enough for this quantity, and nutmeg at half that amount is the usual stand-in.
- Lining the edgesPastry strips pressed onto the wetted rim of the dish give the lid something to grip so steam does not lift it. Cut a vent in the top crust for the same reason.
- SourcingAtlantic halibut stocks are depleted and the fish is best avoided; Pacific halibut is the sound substitute, and turbot or a thick cod loin behave much the same in the dish.
The note of "6d. or 8d. per pound" places halibut below salmon and turbot on the fishmonger's slab, a large, firm-fleshed fish sold in steaks to households feeding a table of seven. The recipe belongs to the long English tradition of the covered fish pie, in which anchovy in some form supplies the savoury depth that a white sauce would otherwise carry. Bottled anchovy sauce and anchovy essence were staples of the Victorian store cupboard, and are often said to descend from the older practice of dressing fish with pickled anchovies; they are the reason so many nineteenth-century fish dishes taste more assertive than their ingredient lists suggest. The instruction to take the middle of the fish reflects the shape of a flatfish: the centre cut gives the thickest, most even flesh, while the thin tail end cooks faster and dries out.