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MULLET, RED (en Papillotes)
Take two table-spoonfuls of capers, dry them in a cloth, and chop them very fine along with a small onion. Mix with this a salt-spoonful each of white pepper and cayenne, and twice as much salt. Butter six circular sheets of white paper, except round the edges; distribute the seasoning equally over six mullets, lay one on each paper and fold over, making the edges meet. This makes a semi-circle. Then begin to fold the edges of the paper over and over, until it reaches the fish. Brush the papers over outside, especially the folds, with oil or butter, then broil or grill carefully. Serve with caper sauce to which a little Madeira has been added.
A Victorian paper-case grill, written for cooks working over a coal fire. The method transfers well to a modern oven or grill pan once you translate the vessel and the heat.
- The hinge: seal the paper properlyThe whole point of the papillote is that no steam escapes; the fish cooks in its own moisture and the caper butter. Fold the curved edge over on itself several times, crimping tightly, and stop only when the folds reach the fish so the packet stays inflated.
- Paper, then and now"White paper" here means kitchen paper of the period, buttered so it would not scorch or stick. Use baking parchment, which needs no greasing on the inside; the outside brushing with oil or butter is still worth doing if you are grilling directly over heat.
- Salt-spoonfulA salt-spoon holds roughly a quarter teaspoon. So about 1/4 tsp each of white pepper and cayenne and 1/2 tsp salt, divided among six fish. The cayenne quantity is assertive by modern standards; halve it if you want the mullet to taste of mullet.
- "Broil or grill"In British usage of this book, both mean cooking over or under direct radiant heat, not oven-roasting. A hot grill or a ridged pan over medium heat works; failing that, a hot oven with a preheated tray (around 425F) is a workable substitute, though it is not the heat the recipe intends.
- TimingThe recipe gives none. Red mullet of 6-8 oz need about 10-12 minutes in the packet; a larger fish of a pound, 15-18. The paper will brown and puff. Check by opening one packet at the table rather than probing them all.
- Red mullet itselfMullus surmuletus, the rouget of French cookery, is unrelated to grey mullet and is not always easy to find. Small sea bream, red snapper fillets or whole branzino take the same treatment, though none has quite the same sweet, faintly shellfish flavour.
- GuttingRed mullet was often cooked ungutted, the liver being reckoned the best of it. Fishmongers now clean fish as a matter of course; if you want it whole and ungutted you must ask, and it should be very fresh indeed.
- The sauceCaper sauce of the period was generally a butter-based white sauce, loosened with fish stock or milk, with chopped capers stirred in. The recipe says only that a little Madeira is added; stirring it in at the end will keep more of its flavour.
- YieldSix whole small fish, one packet per person, as a first course or a light main with potatoes.
Cooking fish in a buttered paper case is a French technique that English cookery books took up under its French name, en papillote. Red mullet suited it particularly well: expensive, delicately flavoured, and prone to drying out over the fierce coal grills of the Victorian kitchen. The fish was often cooked ungutted, its liver left in and eaten with the flesh, and it was known as the "woodcock of the sea" by analogy with the game bird served with its trail. The book presents the dish as an ordinary accomplishment rather than a restaurant flourish, a sign of how far French service had settled into the English dinner. Madeira was a common fortified wine in well-stocked households and a frequent addition to sauces of the period.