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Curried Fish
Peel and cut two medium-sized onions-into thin slices and put in a stewpan with a small lump of butter and fry until lightly browned. Pour over them some white stock, judging the quantity by that of the fish ; add one ounce of butter and a sufficient quantity of curry powder ; season with salt, lemon juice, a little sugar and a small quantity of cayenne. Boil the stock for fifteen or twenty minutes, then strain it into a clean stewpan, skin and put in the fish, having carefully prepared it, and boil gently, but without breaking it. Wash and boil about half a pound of rice in water; when cooked it should be dry and have the grains unbroken. Turn the curry out on to a hot dish, garnish with croutons of fried bread or sippets of toast, and serve very hot, with the rice separate.
Oscar's curry is a stock-based sauce rather than a coconut or cream one, and the recipe assumes you can judge quantities by eye. A few anchors make it workable.
- The hinge: don't boil the fish"Boil gently, but without breaking it" means a bare simmer, barely trembling. Firm white fish in 1-inch pieces needs 4-6 minutes; a whole fillet 8-10. Once it flakes at the thickest point, stop.
- Quantities, since none are givenQuantities, since most are left to the cook -- For 1 1/2 to 2 lb of fish, use about 3 cups white stock, 1 to 2 tablespoons curry powder, the 1 oz (2 tablespoons) butter the recipe specifies beyond the frying butter, a teaspoon of sugar, the juice of half a lemon and a pinch of cayenne. Serves four.
- White stockA pale, unbrowned stock made from veal or poultry bones and aromatics. Fish stock also works here; a light chicken stock is the practical substitute.
- Curry powder in 1896Curry powder of the period -- Commercial curry powders then were generally turmeric-heavy and comparatively mild. Many modern blends are stronger, so add half, taste after the stock has simmered, and adjust before the fish goes in.
- Why the stock is strainedThe onions are cooked out and discarded, leaving a thin, clear, seasoned broth rather than a thick sauce. If you want body, reduce the strained stock further or finish it with a little beurre manie — but the original is deliberately light.
- StewpanA straight-sided saucepan, wide enough to hold the fish in a single layer. Choose something the fish fits into flat so you never have to turn it.
- Sippets and croutonsSippets are small triangles or fingers of toast; croutons here means bread fried in butter, not the diced kind. Both are there to soak up the broth.
- The riceHalf a pound is about 1 1/4 cups dry, serving four generously. Boiled in plenty of salted water and drained, the period method, gives the dry separate grains the recipe asks for.
Curry reached American hotel dining rooms by way of British India and the British table, and by the 1890s a curry of fish or chicken was standard on grand menus — exotic enough to be worth listing, tame enough for cautious guests. This version shows its Anglo-Indian lineage plainly: onions fried in butter, a bought curry powder, stock rather than coconut milk, the sauce strained clear, and the rice served separately in the English manner rather than under the fish. Oscar Tschirky, the Waldorf's celebrated maitre d'hotel, compiled his 1896 book from a mix of sources, drawing heavily on the standard printed cookery of the day, and in it quantities are often left to the cook's judgment.