Literary Feast  ·  Read the passage. Cook the meal.
A bill of fare

Gargantua and Pantagruel

by François Rabelais

GARGANTUA AND PANTAGRUELFRANÇOIS RABELAIS
Our binding, not the publisher's

“Gurnards. Thornbacks. Fried oysters. Salmon trouts. Sleeves. Cockles. Barbels, great and Sturgeons. Prawns. small. Sheath-fish. Smelts. Roaches. Mackerels. Rock-fish. Cockerels. Maids. Gracious lords. Minnows. Plaice. Sword-fish. Skate-fish. Sharplings. Soles. Lamprels. Tunnies. Mussels. Jegs. Silver eels. Lobsters. Pickerels. Chevins. Great prawns. Golden carps. Crayfish. Dace. Burbates. Pallours. Bleaks. Salmons. Shrimps. Tenches. Salmon-peels. Congers. Ombres. Dolphins. Porpoises. Fresh cods. Barn trouts. Bases. Dried melwels. Miller’s-thumbs. Shads. Darefish. Precks. Murenes, a sort of Fausens, and grigs. Bret-fish. lampreys. Eel-pouts. Flounders. Graylings. Tortoises. Sea-nettles. Smys. Serpents, i.e. wood- Mullets. Turbots. eels. Gudgeons. Trout, not above a Dories. Dabs and sandings. foot long. Moor-game. Haddocks. Salmons. Perches. Carps. Meagers. Loaches. Pikes. Sea-breams. Crab-fish. Bottitoes. Halibuts. Snails and whelks. Rochets. Dog’s tongue, or kind Frogs. Sea-bears. fool.”

From a cookbook of 1845

A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.

1845  ·  Acton
BOUDINETTES OF LOBSTERS, PRAWNS, OR SHRIMPS. (ENTRÉE)

(_Author’s Receipt._) When the fish has been prepared as above, mould it in as many _very small_ round cups as will suffice for a dish; heat them gently through at the mouth of the oven or before the fire, and serve them dry, or with a little rich white sauce, coloured with lobster-coral poured round, but not upon them. These _boudinettes_ are delicious, made entirely of shrimps or prawns, which it is an advantage to have prepared as follows, either for this purpose or for potting simply, as they will then be firmer, and will also remain good much longer:—Shell them quickly, and touch them as little as possible in the process; put them into an enamelled saucepan with about three ounces of butter to the quart, and strew the spice upon them; place them by the side of a gentle fire that they may heat through very gradually, and shake the saucepan round occasionally to mingle the seasoning equally with them.

Sources: The passage is from François Rabelais, Gargantua and Pantagruel, tr. Motteux, Peter Anthony, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipe is from Acton, Modern cookery for private families of 1845, also free in full. Both are in the public domain in the United States. The binding above is ours — burgundy cloth, tankard stamp.

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