Potomac Herrings with Roe
When very fresh simply broil them over a slow fire. Baste them with butter, for quarter of an hour. If a few months old and a little dry, soak them before cooking three or four hours. The roe mixed at table with boiled hominy is most delicious for breakfast.
A spring-run river fish, simply broiled and basted, with its prized roe saved for the breakfast table.
- Source the herring wiselyWild river herring — the alewife and blueback that once made these spring runs — are now so depleted that many Atlantic states ban taking them. Don’t harvest or buy wild river herring; make this with sustainably sourced herring, sardines, or mackerel instead, which broil exactly the same way.
- Fresh vs. salted herringTruly fresh herring you just broil; “a few months old and a little dry” means salted herring, which needs a 3–4 hour soak to freshen before cooking.
- Broil low and baste“Over a slow fire” for a quarter hour, brushed with butter — a modern broiler or grill on moderate heat does the same; herring is oily and cooks fast.
- Mind the bonesRiver herring are notoriously bony; broiling crisps the small bones, but eat with care, or fillet the fish first.
- The roe is the treasureHerring roe, lightly cooked, was the delicacy — served here with hominy (nixtamalized corn, in the family of grits) for a classic Chesapeake breakfast.
Every spring the Potomac and its Chesapeake sisters once turned silver with river herring surging upstream to spawn, and the runs were harvested on a colossal scale. George Washington ran one of the more profitable operations at Mount Vernon, where crews netted the fish by the hundreds of thousands to be salted in barrels and sold. Salted herring became a cheap staple protein up and down the tidewater, while the fresh fish and its roe were seasonal treats. Those great runs have since collapsed, and river herring are now so diminished that many states forbid taking them.
From page 26 of the 1904 edition.
Original page from the book
