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Crayfish in the Bush
1/2 POUND SALT PORK, DICED I CUP COOKED CRAY- FISH MEAT, OR I CAN SHRIMP I CAN SPINACH HOT WATER I CUP FRIED FISH, IN PIECES SALT, PEPPER AND CINNAMON Drain spinach and dump it into salt pork sizzling in the pan. When it begins to brown just cover with hot water, simmer 5 minutes, add crayfish or shrimp, and fish. Season with salt, pepper and a very little cinnamon. Cook until water boils away, the slower the better.
This West Indian dish in which spinach is aptly characterized as "the bush" usually is eaten with rice. The English-speaking natives of the West Indies call crawdaddies crayfish, following their British education. Crocodile: Same as alligator, since they're sisters under their hides.
Crow: During this depression crow has become a popular bird out West. Being the farmer's natural enemy, he gets a big kick out of devouring it. The original expression "make him eat crow" isn't a punishment now that the bird appears on restaurant menus. It's been gnawed with unbiased pleasure right down to the bone, ever since it became kosher. Just cook an old crow as you would a hell-diver, crane, or any other tough bird that needs to be marinated to remove the strong smell, and then lard it to supply any fat it may lack. And by the way, swans were a luxury in days of old.
Dog: See Cat. Or, better still, Hot Dogs.
In South China cats and dogs are not only eaten, but their meat is made into medicinal wines. Meat wines sound odd to us, but they're common throughout the Orient. They're cure-alls, made palatable by adding milk, raisins, almonds, lychee nuts, kumquats, and sweets of all sorts.
A sort of Mexican hairless with a black palate is considered the best snacking; but spaniel steaks and collie cutlets are sold in the public market at Haran-gual, Sumatra. War and poverty have popularized cats in Paris and dogs in Berlin, where a butcher shop of dog meat existed even before the other war.
In the Philippines, dogs are the piece de resistance at ceremonious feasts.
Dormice: We don't know exactly what dormice are, unless they're the kind that squeak when they get caught in the pantry door. Anyway, Roman epicures doted on them, but they also cut their teeth on cuttle fish, grew up on devil fish, and simply adored hedgehog.
Eel: Eel is no longer considered exotic in this country; not even conger eel, which is the staff of life to Chileans, as is smoked eel to Hollanders. On the cod fishing boats we take out of Sheepshead Bay, in New York, whenever any lucky fisherman catches a shining silver eel, everybody on board offers to trade his best cod for it.
Smoked eel fetches around $1.00 a pound, the highest price of any local fish in New York markets, except whiting during the Jewish holidays. Because eels are so fine and fat, endless ingenuity has been lavished on countless recipes for them. Contrary to the general rules for preparing their brother and sister fish, eels may be cooked in red wine or eaten with red wine sauces, as well as with white wine, and beer is better than water to boil them in. One can use plenty of herbs with them, too, considerable onion, and even garlic. Spices as well, especially allspice, cloves, cinnamon and mace; also bottled sauces, such as Kitchen Bouquet, Maggi and Worcestershire, which makes them perfect camp fare. An old rhyme has this to say about the doughty eelers of Derryfield: "From the eels they formed their food in chief, And eels were called the Derryfield beef; It was often said that their only care, And their only wish, and their only prayer, For the present world and the world to come, Was a string of eels and a jug of rum."
We always pray for a burlap sack, too, which comes handy both for holding the wigglers after you catch them and for hanging on to the slippery outside when you skin 'em. An eel is hard to kill because the best way is to bang his head until he's dead, and few of us are brutal enough to enjoy this. Then you hang him up on a hook by the gills, cut a ring around under those gills, grab hold of his skin with burlap sack or canvas gloves and peel it down just like taking off milady's long kidskin gloves (but don't bang her on the head first).
A one-pan camp dish of greens braised in pork fat with whatever seafood is on hand. The measurements are loose by design, but a few of the ingredients have shifted since it was written.
- The hinge: cook it down slowlyThe dish is finished only when the water has boiled away and the greens are glossy with pork fat, not swimming. Keep the pan at a bare simmer so the fish holds together; rushing it over high heat shreds the flakes and leaves the spinach watery.
- Canned spinachThe recipe's "1 can" would have been whatever standard size was on the shelf; drained, expect somewhere in the region of a cup of cooked greens. Frozen leaf spinach, thawed and squeezed hard, is the closest substitute; roughly 10 oz frozen, or a pound or more of fresh wilted down, gives a similar volume.
- Salt porkHalf a pound of diced salt pork is a great deal of fat and salt for four ingredients. Render it slowly, pour off all but two or three tablespoons before the spinach goes in, and hold back the salt until the very end.
- Crayfish and shrimpA can of shrimp then meant small cooked shrimp packed in brine, drained and rinsed. Cooked crayfish tails or small peeled shrimp added in the last few minutes work better than canned; anything already cooked needs only to heat through.
- The fried fishThis is leftovers by another name -- a cup of yesterday's fried fish broken into pieces. Any firm cooked white fish serves. Add it at the end and fold rather than stir.
- Cinnamon"A very little" means a pinch, no more than 1/8 teaspoon. The spice is there as a background warmth behind the pork; at any greater quantity it takes over and reads as dessert.
- YieldThe recipe states no yield; the quantities suggest a small dish for two or three when served with rice, as the note at the end of the entry recommends.