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Eels Au Saffron
Cut the heads from two very fresh eels of one and a half pounds each, then skin and cut them into two-inch-long pieces and keep on a plate. Lightly brown in a frying pan a finely minced Spanish onion with a tablespoon butter for five minutes; sprinkle a teaspoon flour over, lightly stir, add the fish on top. Season with a teaspoon salt, half teaspoon white pepper and half teaspoon Spanish saffron, diluted in two tablespoons of water; add three peeled and crushed red tomatoes around the eels; moisten with half gill white wine, cover the pan, and slowly cook on the range for twenty-five minutes. Remove, transfer into a hot dish, sprinkle a little fresh chopped parsley over and serve.
A straightforward braise: aromatics, saffron, tomato, wine, and firm fish that holds up to twenty-five minutes of gentle heat. A few of the measures and one ingredient need translating.
- Half a gill of wineA gill is a quarter-pint, so half a gill is about 2 fl oz by American measure (2.5 fl oz if the imperial pint is meant) — roughly a quarter cup. With the tomatoes it is enough liquid for a covered pan at a bare simmer, but check once or twice that the pan has not gone dry.
- Half a teaspoon of saffronThat is a very large amount by modern reckoning. A generous pinch of threads (roughly 1/4 teaspoon, loosely packed) steeped in the two tablespoons of warm water gives colour and perfume without the medicinal edge saffron takes on in quantity.
- "Slowly cook on the range"Lowest possible heat, lid on, so the surface barely trembles. Eel is fatty and forgiving, but a hard boil will shred the pieces off the bone and break the thin flour-bound sauce.
- Buying and prepping eelAsk the fishmonger to kill, skin and gut it; eel skin is tough and slippery and the job is unpleasant at home. Freshwater eel is sold live at some Chinese and Italian markets and frozen at Japanese ones. European eel is critically endangered and listed on CITES Appendix II; American and Japanese eels are also assessed as endangered, so ask where yours came from and whether it is farmed.
- Eel bloodRaw eel serum contains a protein toxin that irritates skin and eyes and is dangerous if it gets into a cut. Cooking destroys it completely, which is why eel is never eaten raw. Wash hands and board well, and keep raw eel away from your face.
- Spanish onionThen as now, a large sweet yellow onion. One medium is plenty for three pounds of fish.
- Tomatoes"Three peeled and crushed red tomatoes" means ripe summer fruit. Out of season, a cup of drained canned whole tomatoes, crushed by hand, is closer to the intent than pale supermarket ones.
- YieldThree pounds of whole eel yields roughly two pounds on the bone once headed and skinned — four generous portions with bread or boiled potatoes to catch the saffron sauce.
Eel was cheap, abundant and everywhere in European cooking well into the twentieth century, taken from rivers, estuaries and tidal flats and often sold live because the flesh spoils quickly. This treatment — onion, saffron, tomato, white wine — points to the Mediterranean coast, where saffron and eel meet in dishes from Catalonia and Valencia through Provence and into Italy; the specification of Spanish saffron in the original is a period marker, since Spain was a leading producer and exporter, and the label is often said to have carried a suggestion of quality rather than mere geography. The book's "World's Kitchen" section is doing what such compendia did: collecting dishes an American hostess might have met abroad or in an immigrant restaurant and presenting them in a form her cook could follow. That eel needed no introduction to the reader says a good deal about how much the fish counter has changed.