No. 1148

Picked Up Codfish with Cream

Morue Salee a la Creme

Shred the codfish while raw, suppressing all skin and bone; wash it several times in cold water until properly unsalted, then blanch in an abundance of water; drain, and put the fish into a sautoir covering it with cream and let boil until sufficiently reduced thicken with some bechamel (No. 409); season with prepared red pepper (No. 168) and nutmeg. It can either be thickened with the bechamel or else reduce the cream until of a correct consistency. Serve in a deep dish.

← No. 1147 Salt Codfish, Faraday Crowns Cod, Haddock & Halibut No. 1149 Eels a la Marechale →

For the Modern Kitchen

A short entry that assumes you have Ranhofer's other numbered preparations at hand. Two things carry the dish: getting the salt out of the fish, and not letting the cream break while it reduces.

The soak is the whole dish"Wash it several times in cold water until properly unsalted" understates it. Hard salt cod needs 24 to 48 hours in the refrigerator with the water changed three or four times; taste a shred raw before you go further. Undersoaked fish will ruin the cream, and there is no fixing it later.
Shred while rawRanhofer has you pull the fish into threads before cooking; more surface presumably helps the soaking water draw out salt, and it gives the finished dish its texture. In practice hard dry cod will not separate under your fingers until it has softened, so most of the shredding happens after the fish has been in water a while rather than bone dry.
Blanch means a brief boilAfter soaking, drop the shreds into a large volume of unsalted water, bring just to a boil, and drain at once. This is a final salt extraction and a set for the fish, not a cooking step. Salt cod that boils on for ten minutes turns stringy.
SautoirA straight-sided shallow pan, roughly what a modern 10-inch sauté pan or wide saucepan does. The wide surface is the point: it lets the cream reduce quickly rather than stewing the fish.
Béchamel, No. 409B dchamel, No. 409 -- Ranhofer's cross-reference is to his white sauce; in this period that means a butter-and-flour roux kept pale, liquid added, simmered and strained, though his own version may not be milk alone. A few tablespoons of a medium b dchamel is enough. As he says, you can skip it entirely and simply reduce the cream until it coats.
Prepared red pepper, No. 168Another of Ranhofer's numbered seasoning entries, a cayenne preparation; a pinch of plain cayenne will do the job here. Grate the nutmeg fresh and keep it light -- it should sit under the cream, not on top of it.
SaltAdd none until the end, then taste. Even well-soaked cod carries salt, and reducing cream concentrates whatever is there.
Yield and servingRanhofer gives no quantities. As a working guide, roughly a pound of dry salt cod with a couple of cups of heavy cream will serve about four as a first course or a lunch dish. Serve it in the deep dish he calls for; boiled potatoes, toast points or plain rice take up the sauce.

A Little History

Salt cod dressed with cream is long established in French cooking, and versions of morue à la crème turn up widely wherever salt cod was eaten. Charles Ranhofer, chef at Delmonico's in New York across roughly three decades, included it in The Epicurean (1894) between another salt cod preparation (No. 1147) and a dish of eels. The numbered cross-references -- béchamel at No. 409, prepared red pepper at No. 168 -- are how the book works throughout, a professional's shorthand written for cooks who already had the fundamentals standing ready in the kitchen.