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White Bait Garnish
Roll trimmings of puff paste, and cut in pieces threefourths inch long and one-eighth inch wide; fry in deep fat until well browned, and drain on brown paper. Serve on folded napkin, and pass with soup.
Fish Force-meat I 1 egg 2/3 cup raw fish 1/4 cups fine stale bread crumbs 1/4 cup milk
A trimmings recipe: strips of leftover puff paste fried crisp and passed with soup in place of the tiny whole fish they imitate. Note that the text runs on into the next entry — the egg, fish, crumbs and milk belong to "Fish Force-meat I" and have nothing to do with this garnish.
- Fat temperatureThe recipe gives none. Farmer judges deep fat by how fast a bread cube browns, forty seconds for cooked mixtures and sixty for uncooked, which modern cooks place in the region of 350-375F. Puff paste puffs and colours fast at that heat; much cooler and the layers absorb fat instead of setting.
- Cut them small and evenThree-quarters of an inch by an eighth is deliberately thread-like, because the point is the silhouette of whitebait. Cut the strips with a knife or wheel rather than tearing, and keep the thickness uniform or the thin ones burn before the thick ones puff.
- Rest the paste before fryingTrimmings have been rolled and handled, so the gluten is tight and the layers compressed. Half an hour in the refrigerator before cutting keeps the strips from shrinking and curling into knots in the fat.
- Brown paperThis is the period's draining surface, meaning unbleached wrapping or grocer's paper. A rack over a tray, or paper towel, does the same job; the strips should be spread in a single layer so steam does not soften them.
- QuantityThe original gives none, since it is written to use up whatever paste is left; a small handful beside each plate is the intent.
- Timing and holdingFry in small batches and expect well under two minutes to a good brown. They are best within an hour; if they must wait, crisp them in a 300F oven for a few minutes rather than refrying.
- Serving"Serve on folded napkin" means a linen napkin folded in a shallow dish, which absorbs remaining fat and keeps the strips from sliding. Pass them separately so they meet the soup only at the last moment.
Whitebait — the fry of herring, sprat and similar small fish — was a fashionable English dish of the nineteenth century, floured and fried whole by the handful and eaten with lemon and brown bread; the Thames whitebait dinners at Greenwich were a set piece of the political calendar. Fannie Farmer's answer here is frank imitation: slivers of puff paste trimming fried to the same brown, brittle, tangled look and passed with soup the way crackers or croutons would be. It is a garnish that exists to use up what is already on the board rather than to add an ingredient, and the name survives as a description of appearance long after the fish itself has dropped out of the picture.