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Cold Trout, Lombardi
Trim off fins, draw by the gills and neatly wipe three very fresh brook trout. Place in a sautoire with half ounce butter, two tablespoons vinegar, one small branch tarragon, one branch parsley, half gill white wine, teaspoon salt and two saltspoons white pepper, place on fire and let slowly come to a boil. Remove to a table and keep fish in the seasoning until cold. Then dress on a cold dish with a folded napkin over, decorate with a little parsley greens and serve with a St. Gotthard sauce separately.
A cold poached trout for three, cooked in almost no liquid and then left to cool in its own seasoning. The method is sound; only the vessel, the measures and the sauce need translating.
- SautoireA shallow straight-sided pan with a lid — a modern saute pan or a small braiser. The fish should lie flat in one layer without crowding.
- The measuresHalf a gill of white wine is 1/4 cup; a saltspoon is about 1/4 teaspoon, so two make 1/2 teaspoon of white pepper. Half an ounce of butter is one tablespoon.
- Draw by the gillsGutting through the gill opening rather than slitting the belly, so the fish stays whole and holds its shape when served cold. A fishmonger may do this if asked; otherwise a belly-gutted trout works, it simply looks less tidy.
- The hinge: barely cook itThere is only about 3 fl oz of liquid here, so the trout steam as much as poach. The recipe says to let it come slowly to a boil; take the pan off the heat at that point — a covered 8 to 10 oz brook trout should be done in roughly 8 minutes, when the flesh at the backbone has just turned opaque. Trout held at a rolling boil splits and goes cottony, and it will firm further as it cools.
- Cooling in the liquorDo not lift the fish out. Letting it come to room temperature in the vinegar, wine and herbs is what seasons it; only then refrigerate, and serve cool rather than fridge-cold so the flavour reads.
- St. Gotthard sauceThe recipe sends you to a St. Gotthard sauce it does not give; the name is not one you will find on a modern shelf. Any cold green herb sauce — a mayonnaise worked with tarragon, parsley and chervil — sits in the same place on the plate.
- The folded napkinPeriod service: a linen napkin folded on the platter, which would have taken up drips and kept the fish from sliding. Decorative now, and easily skipped.
- YieldThree trout, three servings, as a first course or a light lunch with bread and the sauce alongside.
This comes from Alexander Filippini's The International Cook Book (1906), the work of a longtime Delmonico's chef who compiled several thousand short recipes, many of them carrying French, national or regional tags. Cold poached trout in an acidulated liquor is a familiar treatment for freshwater fish — vinegar was often used in the cooking liquid, both for flavour and because acid firms the delicate flesh. The two proper names are most likely geography rather than authorship: Lombardy on the Italian side, and the St. Gotthard pass through the Alps to the north of it; the book itself explains neither. That the recipe insists on "very fresh brook trout" suits a period when such fish were likely to arrive small and whole, and best dealt with the same day.