No. 1188

Lafayette Fish, Breaded English Style

Poisson Lafayette Pane a l'Anglaise

Score the fish on both sides on the thick fillets; season with salt and pepper. Melt lightly two ounces of fresh butter, stir into it six raw egg-yolks, salt, pepper, and nutmeg; dip the fish into this mixture, then roll it in bread-crumbs, smooth the surface nicely, and fry a fine color in very hot clarified butter; drain, wipe and salt the fish, then dress it on a folded napkin and garnish with fried parsley and quartered lemons.

← No. 1187 Kingfish on the Dish—Gastrite Pompano, Snapper & Other Fish No. 1189 Lamprey a la Rabelais →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer's a l'Anglaise is simply a rich egg-and-butter dip standing in for the usual beaten egg, and the coating is where the dish succeeds or fails. Six yolks is a working quantity for four to six small fish, not for one.

The fishLafayette is the New York market name for spot, Leiostomus xanthurus, a small Atlantic drum of about half a pound. Any small pan-fish with firm white flesh works: whiting, small croaker, sand dab, or fillets of snapper cut to portion size.
Scoring, and whyThe shallow diagonal cuts through the thickest part of the flank let heat reach the centre before the crumb crust darkens. On a whole fish of 8-12 oz make three cuts a side, just to the bone; skip it on thin fillets.
The dipMelt the butter only until it is soft and barely liquid, off the heat, before stirring in the yolks. If the butter is hot the yolks scramble and the coating goes lumpy. Two ounces of butter to six yolks gives a thick, mayonnaise-like cream that clings much better than plain beaten egg.
QuantityThe recipe never says how many fish it is meant to coat; two ounces of butter with six yolks is far more dip than one small fish needs, so it was probably written for a service of several. Scale the yolks down proportionally rather than making the full amount for two portions.
Clarified butterThe book gives no figure; "very hot" in a frying context is usually taken today as somewhere around 340-360F. Butter with its milk solids removed can take that heat; whole butter burns well below it. Ghee is the direct substitute, or use half clarified butter and half neutral oil.
DonenessSmall whole fish take three to four minutes a side at that temperature; fillets, two to three. The crumb should be deep gold. Internal temperature of 130-135F at the backbone is plenty — the flesh should just release from the bone.
Fried parsleyDry the sprigs thoroughly and drop them into the fat for about ten seconds after the fish comes out. Wet parsley spits violently in hot butter. They should stay bright green and turn brittle, not brown.
The napkinDressing fried fish on a folded napkin was standard nineteenth-century practice to absorb butter at the table. A rack over a warm plate does the same job; if you want the period look, fold the napkin and set the fish on it at the last moment.

A Little History

Spot were landed in enormous numbers off New York and the Chesapeake through the nineteenth century, and the name "Lafayette" is traditionally explained by a run of the fish coinciding with the Marquis de Lafayette's celebrated American tour in 1824 — a story repeated in period fish-market literature, though it is folk etymology rather than documented fact. Whatever the origin, the name stuck in New York markets, which is why Charles Ranhofer, chef of Delmonico's, treats it as a familiar item alongside pompano and kingfish in The Epicurean (1894). The treatment itself is French kitchen shorthand: a l'anglaise means egg-and-crumbed, the English manner as the French classified it, and enriching the egg wash with butter and yolks alone is the sort of small luxury that distinguished a Delmonico's plate from a chophouse one.