Sandwiches
anchovy, a tablespoonful of good stock, a dash of cayenne and the juice of half a lemon; mix and rub the whole to a smooth paste. Take a round biscuit cutter and cut from thin slices of stale bread, round sandwiches, spread each one lightly with butter, and toast in the oven until a golden brown. Spread a layer of the mixture on each of these, place two together. Rub four tablespoonfuls of Parmesan cheese and two tablespoonfuls of butter to a paste, spread a thin covering of this over the top of each sandwich, stand in the oven a few moments, and send to the table hot.
The page begins mid-sentence, so the head of the ingredient list is lost; what survives is a hot anchovy-and-cheese canapé of the kind Victorian and Edwardian books filed under savouries. The instructions themselves are complete enough to follow.
- The missing first lineThe recipe opens in the middle of an ingredient list, so the first ingredient or two are lost. The surviving text gives no indication of what they were; anything added is guesswork. A workable reconstruction is to pound one filleted anchovy (or a teaspoon of anchovy paste) with two or three hard-boiled egg yolks, which with the stock and lemon gives a paste of spreadable consistency.
- Anchovy"An anchovy" here means a single cured fish from the barrel or jar, not a whole tin; period recipes counted whole fish, so reckon roughly two modern fillets. Oil-packed fillets are generally milder than barrel-salted fish, so taste before adding more; anchovy paste from a tube works and needs no rinsing.
- Good stockA tablespoon of well-reduced meat or veal stock, used purely to loosen the paste and add savour. Reduced canned broth or a scant teaspoon of demi-glace stands in; avoid a bouillon cube, which will push the salt past the anchovy.
- Stale breadDay-old firm white bread cuts cleanly with a cutter and will not tear when spread. Slices about a quarter-inch thick and a cutter of roughly 1.5 inches give a two-bite sandwich.
- Toasting the roundsThe recipe gives no temperature or time. A moderate oven, around 375F for 6 to 8 minutes with a turn partway, will do it; the buttered rounds should be crisp all through, since a soft base will collapse under the moist filling.
- The cheese finishFour tablespoons of grated Parmesan creamed with two of butter is a stiff paste; spread it thin. "A few moments" means only long enough to gloss and soften -- a couple of minutes in a hot oven, or well under a minute under a closely watched broiler. Cooked longer the butter separates and runs off.
- Serve immediatelyThese are a hot savoury and go limp within minutes. Assemble ahead, cheese and bake at the last moment.
- YieldDepending on the cutter, eight thin slices will give somewhere between a dozen and sixteen small double sandwiches, and the cheese paste is enough to top them thinly -- a savoury course for four to six.
Hot anchovy toasts belong to the English savoury, the small salty course served at the end of a formal dinner after the sweet, and they carried over into the American repertoire of "dainty" sandwiches for luncheons, teas and card parties. Anchovy in paste or essence form was one of the few reliably strong flavourings a nineteenth-century larder kept year-round, and it turns up constantly bound with butter or hard-boiled egg yolk; the pairing with Parmesan, itself a long-keeping import, made a dish that needed no fresh meat and little cooking. That is the source of its appeal in warm weather: the whole thing can be assembled cold from store-cupboard goods and finished with a few minutes' heat rather than an afternoon at the range.