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Salmon Loaf
One can of salmon Two-thirds cup of cracker crumbs Two-thirds cup of cracker crumbs Three-quarters cup of milk Two eggs One tablespoon of butter One teaspoon Larkin Table Salt One-quarter teaspoon of Larkin Pepper Beat lemon into eggs. Put the fish and crackers into the dish in layers, and steam an hour. Serve with cream sauce.
The ingredient list has clearly lost a line or two in printing: no salmon is listed, and no lemon, though the method calls for both. Everything else is a straightforward steamed fish pudding, and it works once you supply the missing amounts.
- The missing salmonAssume one 1-lb can of salmon, drained and flaked, which gives about two cups; that is a plausible match for this quantity of crumbs and milk, though the printed recipe gives no amount. Pick out the skin if you like, but mash the soft vertebrae in; they soften in canning and add calcium.
- The missing lemon"Beat lemon into eggs" points to a tablespoon or two of juice, or the grated zest of half a lemon, whisked with the eggs before the layering. The acid presumably serves to cut the richness of the canned fish.
- Cracker crumbsPlain soda crackers or saltines, crushed fine — not graham, not seasoned crumbs. Soak them in the milk for ten minutes before assembling so the loaf sets evenly rather than in dry seams.
- Larkin salt and pepperLarkin & Co. was a Buffalo mail-order house that sold groceries and household goods with premiums; its own-brand salt and pepper are simply table salt and ground black pepper. Use one teaspoon and a quarter teaspoon respectively.
- "Into the dish"A buttered mold, pudding basin or loaf tin, covered tightly with buttered paper or foil so condensation does not fall in. Set it on a rack in a deep pan with boiling water reaching halfway up the sides, lid on, and keep the water at a bare simmer, topping up as needed.
- An hour is about rightSteaming is gentle enough that the hour is not excessive, but check with a thermometer rather than the clock: 160F at the center means set. Overcooked salmon loaf weeps and turns grainy.
- Cream sauceA thin béchamel — one tablespoon butter, one tablespoon flour, one cup milk, salt — cooked two or three minutes past the point where the flour smells raw. Chopped parsley, a little of the lemon, or a spoonful of capers all suit it.
- YieldServes four as a main course with potatoes, or six as part of a larger supper. It slices better warm than hot, and is good cold the next day.
Canned salmon made this dish possible for inland households: after the Pacific canneries scaled up in the 1870s and 1880s, tinned salmon became one of the cheapest sources of protein in the American pantry, and cookbooks filled with croquettes, timbales and loaves built on a can, some crumbs, milk and eggs. The steamed loaf belongs to the older tradition of savory puddings cooked in a mold in a kettle of water — the method predates reliable home ovens and survived because it is forgiving with lean, easily overcooked fish. That the seasonings here are specified by brand tells you what kind of book this is: Larkin & Co. of Buffalo sold groceries by mail, and recipe pamphlets naming Larkin salt and Larkin pepper did double duty as cookery and catalogue.