Boiled Fish
Wash well in cold water; wipe and rub with salt. Wrap in a cloth, drop in a long kettle partly filled with boiling water. Add I bay leaf, 1 slice of onion, 1 teaspoonful of salt and 2 tablespoonfuls of vinegar. Cover and simmer gently, allowing about ten minutes for each pound.
When the bones begin to draw away from the flesh lift out carefully and drain. Open the cloth and turn out carefully on a hot platter. Garnish with greens or sliced lemon.
A plain court-bouillon poaching method for a whole fish, written when nearly every kitchen had a long fish kettle. The technique still works; the timing and the vessel need adjusting.
- The cloth is the whole pointA whole poached fish falls apart the moment you try to lift it. Wrapping it in a doubled piece of cheesecloth or clean muslin, with the ends left long enough to grip, is what lets you get it out intact. A perforated poaching rack or a folded strip of foil does the same job.
- If you have no fish kettleA roasting pan set across two burners takes a fish of 3-4 lb; curve a larger one to fit a wide Dutch oven, or cut it in two and reassemble on the platter. The fish should be barely covered by liquid.
- Don't drop it into boiling waterThe instruction reflects older practice. Boiling water sets the outside hard and can split the skin, and "simmer gently" thereafter means water that trembles at around 180F, never a rolling boil. Starting the fish in hot-but-not-boiling liquid gives more even cooking.
- Ten minutes a pound is longModern practice is usually given as about 10 minutes per inch of thickness at the thickest point, measured for the whole fish rather than per pound; some cooks work to 8. A 4 lb salmon or striped bass is usually done in 20-25 minutes.
- A better doneness testThe bones drawing away from the flesh is a real sign, but by then the thin parts are overcooked. Test at the backbone with a thin knife or an instant-read thermometer; USDA guidance for fish is 145F, though many cooks lift it at 135-140F at the spine and let it carry over as it drains.
- The aromatics are minimalOne bay leaf, one onion slice and 2 tablespoons vinegar in several quarts of water flavors very little. The vinegar is there mainly to firm the flesh and keep it white. A few peppercorns, parsley stems, a carrot and a cup of white wine cost little and give a court-bouillon worth saving as stock.
- Salting the liquidA teaspoon of salt for a kettleful is close to nothing. Poaching liquid should taste seasoned, on the order of a tablespoon of salt per quart, if the fish is to be eaten warm without sauce.
- Yield and servingA whole fish of 3-4 lb serves four as a main course. Serve hot with drawn butter, egg sauce or hollandaise, or chill it and serve with mayonnaise.
Boiling a whole fish wrapped in a cloth was a common way to bring it to a nineteenth-century table, and the fish kettle - a long, narrow, lidded pan with a perforated lifting plate - was familiar enough that recipes tended to assume rather than describe it. The method belongs to the family of dishes cooked in court-bouillon, French for "short broth," a quickly made acidulated liquid whose vinegar or wine both seasons the fish and helps keep the flesh firm and pale. Poaching demands no fat, no oven and no expensive cut, and it turns a cheap whole fish, bones and head included, into something that can be carried in on a platter and garnished. Cold poached fish, set in its own gelatin, was a familiar supper dish as well.