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Fried Salmon
Cut some thin slices of salmon, sprinkle them over with salt, and leave for fifteen or twenty minutes. Dredge flour over the slices of salmon, brush over with the beaten yolk of egg, and fry in boiling salad oil. When cooked, drain the slices of salmon well, and place them on an ornamental dish-paper or a folded napkin on a hot dish, garnish with fried parsley, and serve.
A plain flour-and-egg fry that depends almost entirely on cutting the fish thin and keeping the oil hot. The salting step is the only thing in it that looks optional and is not.
- Thin means thinCut the salmon across the grain into slices about 1/2 inch thick, or use small escalopes cut from a centre-cut fillet. Thick pieces will not cook through before the egg coating browns and toughens.
- The salt restFifteen to twenty minutes of dry salting firms the surface and draws out enough moisture that the flour will adhere. Pat the slices dry before flouring or the coating will slide off in the pan.
- "Boiling salad oil"Salad oil in 1896 could mean olive oil, though cottonseed oil was also widely sold under that name; "boiling" means shimmering and just short of smoking, not literally boiling. Aim for 350-375F; use a neutral oil with a high smoke point if you would rather not fry in olive oil.
- Egg yolk, not whole eggYolk alone gives a thin golden glaze rather than a puffed batter. Loosen it with a teaspoon of water or oil so it brushes on evenly.
- Cooking timeTwo to three minutes a side is enough for a half-inch slice. Modern kitchens often pull salmon at 125-130F in the centre, though public-health guidance for fish is 145F; well past that it dries out badly. The original leaves the timing to the cook's eye.
- Fried parsleyDrop dry curly parsley sprigs into the same hot oil for about 15 seconds until they stop spitting and turn a deep green. Wet parsley will erupt, so dry it thoroughly first.
- The dish-paperAn ornamental dish-paper is a doily-like paper liner used to absorb frying oil at the table. A folded napkin does the same job, and paper towel followed by transfer to a warm plate is the modern equivalent.
- YieldFigure 5-6 oz of salmon per person as a main course, less if it is following soup in the manner of the period. Serve at once with lemon; the coating softens within minutes.
Oscar Tschirky's 1896 Cook Book was assembled while he was maître d'hôtel of the Waldorf, and much of it reads as a working reference rather than a set of showpieces: short, unfussy entries a professional kitchen could execute at volume. Fried salmon belongs to that category. Salmon reached New York restaurants in quantity by rail and ice through the 1880s and 1890s, and the book treats it in several ways, including, as here, egged and fried. The garnish of fried parsley and the folded napkin are hallmarks of the period's service, where a fried dish was expected to arrive dry, on something absorbent, with a spot of green for contrast.