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Baked Finnan Haddie
Put fish in dripping-pan, surround with milk and water in equal proportions, place on back of range, where it will heat slowly. Let stand twenty-five minutes; pour off liquid, spread with butter, and bake twenty-five minutes.
Finnan haddie is cold-smoked haddock, cured hard and salted for keeping, and this recipe is essentially two steps: freshen it, then bake it. Neither step is timed for a modern range.
- The hinge: the soak is not cookingThe twenty-five minutes in milk and water is there to draw out salt and soften the flesh, not to cook it. Use liquid that is hot but not simmering; if it boils the fish tightens and the finished dish is stringy.
- "Back of range"On a coal or wood range the back was the coolest zone, holding perhaps 150-170F. A low burner on its lowest setting, or a covered pan in a 170F oven, gives the same gentle heat.
- Oven temperatureNone is given; the recipe says only "bake twenty-five minutes," as was common in cookbooks of the period. A moderate oven, around 350F, works for the baking stage.
- Baking timeTwenty-five minutes suits a thick whole fillet or a split fish on the bone. Thin modern fillets of half a pound or so are done in 12-15 minutes, when the flesh flakes and looks opaque throughout.
- Buying the fishGenuine finnan haddie is dry-salted and cold-smoked, pale straw in color. The bright yellow-orange dyed fillets sold as smoked haddock are a different, wetter cure and need little or no freshening; taste the soaking liquid to judge.
- "Dripping-pan"The large shallow roasting pan that sat under a roast. Any rimmed baking dish works, but choose one just big enough that the milk and water surround the fish rather than swamp it.
- Milk and waterEqual parts whole milk and water. The liquid is poured off and discarded, so there is no reason to use cream, and skim milk does the job equally well.
- Yield and servingFigure 6-8 oz of fish per person. It was served at breakfast or supper with boiled potatoes, and a poached egg on top is a common accompaniment.
Finnan haddie is often said to take its name from Findon, a fishing village south of Aberdeen, though the derivation is folk-traditional and contested, with Findhorn also claimed; the cure is generally traced to that stretch of the Scottish east coast, where haddock were split, salted and hung in the smoke of peat or hardwood. It reached American tables through the North Atlantic trade and through Scottish immigration, and by the time Fannie Farmer compiled the Boston Cooking-School Cook Book in 1896 it appears to have been a familiar item in New England fish markets, reportedly sold as a breakfast fish alongside salt cod and smoked herring. The method here reflects how heavily cured the fish then was: before refrigeration and fast shipping, smoked haddock was salted for keeping rather than for flavor, and American recipes for it commonly begin by soaking or steeping to make it edible.