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Halibut a la Poulette
A slice of halibut, weighing 1 1/2 lbs. 1/4 cup melted butter 1/8 teaspoon pepper 2 teaspoons lemon juice Few drops onion juice 1/4 teaspoon salt Clean fish and cut in eight fillets. Add seasonings to melted butter, and put dish containing butter in saucepan of hot water to keep butter melted. Take up each fillet separately with a fork, dip in butter, roll and fasten with a small wooden skewer. Put in a shallow pan, dredge with flour, and bake twelve minutes in hot oven. Remove skewers, arrange on platter for serving, pour around one and one-half cups Bechamel Sauce, and garnish with yolks of two hard-boiled eggs rubbed through a strainer, whites of hard-boiled eggs cut in strips, lemon cut fan-shaped, and parsley.
A straightforward baked halibut dressed up in the late-Victorian manner, with the fish rolled into pinwheels and sauced at the table. The whole thing depends on not overbaking.
- Oven temperature"Hot oven" in books of this period is usually read as roughly 400-450F. Twelve minutes at that heat suits thin fillets rolled small; halibut is done the moment the flesh turns opaque and flakes, and it dries out quickly past that point.
- Cutting the filletsA 1 1/2 lb halibut steak cut into eight pieces gives strips of a little under 3 oz each, since the skin and centre bone should be removed first.
- SkewersSmall wooden skewers means cocktail picks or toothpicks. Soak them briefly so they do not scorch, and count them as you remove them before serving.
- Onion juiceGrate a peeled onion on a fine rasp and press the pulp through a strainer, or grate directly and use the liquid that beads on the plate. A few drops is enough to season without reading as onion.
- Keeping the butter meltedThe dish of seasoned butter sits in a pan of hot water so it stays liquid while you dip eight fillets in turn. Off the heat it will set and cling unevenly.
- BechamelIn this period Bechamel could be built on veal or chicken stock as well as milk. A cup and a half of ordinary milk-based bechamel, seasoned well, will serve; make it before the fish goes in the oven.
- DredgingA light dusting of flour over the rolls, not a coating. It gives the tops a little colour in the short baking time.
- YieldEight rolls serve four as a main course, or six as part of a longer meal. The sieved egg yolk and cut whites should go on at the last moment.