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Salmon Pudding
Take half a pound of cold cooked salmon freed from skin and bone. Tear it into flakes, then pound it is a mortar to smooth paste. Boil a quarter of pound of grated crumbs in as much milk as they will absorb. Beat these ingredients till they form a smooth paste, and when cool mix this with the salmon, and add a seasoning of salt and cayenne, a grate or two or nutmeg, and half a tea-spoonful of essence of anchovies. Pound the pudding again until the seasoning is thoroughly incorporated, and add two or more well-whisked eggs. Press the preparation into a thickly-buttered mould, and bake in a moderate oven; or, if preferred, roll it into the shape of a roly-poly pudding, dredge it well with flour, and wrap it first in buttered paper and afterwards in a pudding cloth. Fasten the ends, and steam the pudding until done enough. Turn it out carefully, and serve with thin custard sauce flavoured with laurel-leaf. the pudding will be richer if cream is used instead of milk, and if additional eggs are allowed. Time to steam or bake the pudding, a little more than half an hour. Probable cost, exclusive of the cold salmon, 8d. Sufficient for four or five persons.
A Victorian way of turning leftover poached salmon into a moulded hot pudding, built on a bread panada. It works, but two things in the text need attention: the flavouring of the sauce, and the assumption that you own a mortar.
- The laurel leaf, firstVictorian cookery books use "laurel" for both bay laurel and cherry laurel (Prunus laurocerasus), whose leaves were once steeped in custards for an almond flavour and which release hydrogen cyanide. Read this as bay, and use bay only; do not infuse cherry laurel of any kind.
- Moderate oven350F/175C. The pudding is already cooked fish held together by egg and panada, so it needs only to set through, not to brown.
- Timing"a little more than half an hour" is plausible for a mould of this quantity, baked or steamed; the recipe gives no mould size. It is done when the centre reaches about 160F/70C and the pudding shrinks very slightly from the sides.
- The panadaA quarter pound of grated crumbs is roughly two cups of fresh crumbs; add milk until they will take up no more, as the recipe directs. Cook them to a stiff, clean paste that leaves the pan in one lump, then cool before adding the fish, or the eggs will scramble.
- PoundingA food processor does in thirty seconds what the mortar does in ten minutes. Pulse rather than run it, and stop while a little flake structure remains, unless you genuinely want the smooth forcemeat texture the original asks for.
- Essence of anchoviesA thin, salty Victorian bottled sauce. Half a teaspoon of anchovy paste, or a scant teaspoon of Asian fish sauce, gives the same background savour. Season with salt only after it goes in.
- EggsTwo eggs to twelve ounces of solids is the minimum bind; three gives a firmer slice and a lighter pudding. More than four and it turns custardy.
- The cloth methodIf you steam it as a roly-poly, flour the cloth as well as the pudding and tie the ends loosely so the mixture can swell. Buttered foil over parchment is the practical modern substitute.
- Leftover fishThe cold salmon should have been refrigerated since cooking and used within two days. This is a reheating recipe, so bring the pudding fully hot through the centre rather than serving it warm.
- ServingFour to five as a light main course, as stated. A thin pouring custard is faithful to the book; a bay-scented béchamel or hollandaise suits most modern palates better.
Fish puddings of this kind belong to the great Victorian project of making cold remains presentable a second time. Such books assumed a household with a mortar, a pudding cloth and yesterday's boiled salmon, and the panada — bread cooked in milk to a paste — was a common binder for quenelles, forcemeats and moulded puddings. The pairing with a sweet custard sauce looks startling now, but flavoured custards served as a sauce as well as a dessert in Victorian kitchens, and almond-scented ones were common; the "laurel-leaf" flavouring is often said to reflect a period habit of using laurel leaves as a cheap substitute for almond essence, a practice cookery writers themselves are reported to have warned against. The costing in pence, given exclusive of the salmon, is the book's way of showing the mistress of the house exactly what the second appearance of a dish adds to the week's bill.