“"There is an old, old house whose business has been fish oil within the memory of men. And here is another. Next, through Water Street, one comes in search of the last word on salt fish. Now the air is filled with gorgeous smell of roasting coffee. Tea, coffee, sugar, rice, spices, bags and bagging here have their home. And there are haughty bonded warehouses filled with fine liquors. From his white cabin at the top of a venerable structure comes the dean of the salt-fish business. 'Export trade fair,' he says; 'good demand from South America.'"”
A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.
(_To Serve Cold._) Turn into a _small_ deep frying-pan, which should be kept for the purpose, a flask of fresh olive oil, place it over a clear fire, and as soon as it ceases to bubble lay in a pound and a half of delicate salmon properly cleansed and well dried in a cloth, and fry it gently until it is cooked quite through. The surface should be only lightly browned, and when the proper colour is attained the pan must be lifted so high from the fire as to prevent it being deepened, as we have directed in Chapter IX. in the general instructions for frying. Drain the fish well when it is done, and when it is perfectly cold, dish, and garnish it with light foliage. The Jews have cold fried fish much served at their repasts. Fillets of soles, plaice, brill, small turbots, or other flat fish, may be fried as above, and arranged in a symmetrical form round a portion of a larger fish, or by themselves.
Sources: The passage is from Grant M. (Grant Martin) Overton, When Winter Comes to Main Street, 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 — slate cloth, teapot stamp.