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Findon Haddock, Broiled
Lightly roll in oil one and a half pounds fine thick, smoked findon haddock. Arrange in a double broiler and broil for five minutes on each side. Dress on a hot dish, and serve with Maitre d'hotel butter, nicely spread over.
A three-line recipe that assumes you know what finnan haddie is and own a hinged broiler. Both assumptions need a little unpacking.
- "Double broiler" is not a double boilerThis means a hinged wire broiling basket — two grids that clamp the fish so it can be turned in one motion without breaking. A fish-grilling basket over coals, or a well-oiled rack under the broiler, does the same job. If you turn the fillet with a spatula instead, cook it skin-side up first and turn only once.
- Findon haddockFinnan haddie: haddock split, brined and cold-smoked, named for Findon in Kincardineshire. Cold smoke does not cook the fish, which is why it goes under the broiler. Buy it undyed if you can — much commercial "smoked haddock" is coloured a hard yellow with annatto or tartrazine and tastes of very little.
- SaltTraditional finnan is cured hard. Taste a raw corner; if it is aggressively salty, soak the fish in milk or cold water for 20 to 30 minutes and pat dry before oiling. Modern lightly-cured fillets rarely need it.
- Five minutes a side is for a thick split fishA whole split haddock an inch thick at the shoulder wants that. Today's boneless fillets run half that thickness and will be dry at ten minutes total. Work from a hot broiler about four inches away and count on six to eight minutes total, stopping when the flesh flakes and turns opaque.
- Maitre d'hotel butterSoftened butter worked with chopped parsley, lemon juice, salt and pepper — roughly 4 tablespoons butter to 1 tablespoon parsley and 2 teaspoons juice. Roll in paper, chill firm, and lay coins on the hot fish so it melts at the table rather than in the pan.
- Oil, lightlySmoked haddock has almost no surface fat and will weld itself to a dry grid. A thin film of neutral oil on both fish and rack is the whole of it; more will smoke and flare under a broiler.
- YieldA pound and a half serves three as a main course or four at breakfast, which is where this dish belonged in the period.
Finnan haddie takes its name from Findon, a fishing village south of Aberdeen, and the cure is generally traced to the Aberdeenshire coast in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century, where haddock were split, salted and hung in the smoke of peat or hardwood. It travelled well and cured fish kept, so by the time this book was compiled it was a fixture of British and American breakfast and supper tables far from Scotland ‖ poached in milk, made into kedgeree, or, as here, simply broiled and finished with a compound butter. A Scottish curing house supplies the fish and a French garnish dresses it.