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Fish Chowder (With Salt Pork)
Cut three pounds of any kind of fresh fish (codfish is especially good), one and one-half pounds of potatoes and one large onion into slices; and half a pound of salt pork into half-inch squares or dice. Put the pork and onions into a saucepan and fry them a light brown; then add a cup of claret, and when it boils take it from the fire. Butter a large stewpan and put in first a layer of potatoes, then a layer of fish, then a sprinkle of onions and pork (strained from the claret), pepper and salt, and continue these alternations until it is all in, having the potatoes on top. Now pour the claret over the top and barely cover the whole with boiling water.
Cover closely and let it simmer for fifteen minutes without disturbing it.
A layered chowder built in one pot, with red wine instead of the milk or cream most American chowders use. The whole thing hinges on cutting the potatoes thin enough to cook in the fifteen minutes the fish needs.
- Slice the potatoes thinFifteen minutes is barely enough for potato, so cut the slices no thicker than an eighth of an inch. Thick rounds will still be chalky when the fish has gone to shreds.
- ClaretIn this period claret means dry red Bordeaux, or any dry red in practice. Take the cup as roughly 8 oz. It is brought to a boil with the pork and onion, then the solids are strained out and the wine poured over the assembled layers.
- StewpanRead this as a wide, heavy pot with a tight lid — a 5 to 6 quart Dutch oven or braiser. Width matters more than depth, because the layers should be shallow enough to heat through evenly.
- Salt porkHalf a pound of salt pork is a substantial amount of salt as well as fat. Taste before adding any more salt in the layering, and if the pork is very heavily cured, blanch the dice a minute or two first. Thick-cut bacon is the nearest common substitute, but most of it is smoked, which the original does not want; unsmoked (green) bacon or fatback is closer.