Home › The World's Kitchen › Spanish Mackerel, Colbert
Spanish Mackerel, Colbert
Trim off the fins and cut off the head from a three-pound fresh Spanish mackerel. Split in two through the back, remove the spinal bone. Mix on a plate a teaspoon of oil, teaspoon salt and half teaspoon paprika, then repeatedly turn the fish in the seasoning. Arrange them on a broiler and broil six minutes on each side. Remove, dress on a hot dish. Pour a Colbert sauce over and serve.
A plain broiled fish whose whole character comes from the sauce, which the recipe assumes you already know how to make. Two things need attention: the sauce, and the fact that six minutes a side is too long for most fish sold today.
- Colbert sauce, since the book will not tell youIn the classic repertoire it is maitre d'hotel butter — softened butter creamed with lemon juice, chopped parsley, salt and pepper — enriched with a spoonful of meat glaze and chopped tarragon. It is a compound butter rather than a true liquid sauce, though the book's "pour" suggests it was served warm and barely melted; work it cold and let the heat of the fish do the rest.
- Broiling timeA 3 lb mackerel split flat gives sides roughly an inch thick at the shoulder, which is what twelve total minutes assumes. Mackerel fillets from a fish counter today are often half that, and six minutes a side will dry them out. Work to about 130–135F at the thickest point and expect four to six minutes total for thin fillets.
- Split through the backThis is butterflying from the dorsal side rather than the belly, so the fish opens into a single flat piece with the belly skin holding it together. Snip the pin bones out with kitchen shears after lifting the backbone.
- The oil is too littleA teaspoon of oil will not coat both halves of a 3 lb fish. Use a tablespoon or more, enough to film the flesh, or the surface sticks to the broiler and tears.
- "Arrange them on a broiler"A period broiler is a hinged wire grid held over coals or under a gas flame, turned bodily. Under a modern overhead broiler, preheat it fully, set the rack 4 inches below, and cook skin side down first so the flesh sets before you flip.
- The fish itselfSpanish mackerel is a warm-water western Atlantic and Gulf species, oily and firm. Spanish or king mackerel work, as does bluefish or Atlantic mackerel (sold as Boston mackerel), which is softer-fleshed and takes a slightly gentler heat.
- Meat glazeGlace de viande is veal or beef stock reduced to a syrup. A commercial demi-glace concentrate stands in; use it sparingly, as modern versions are far saltier than a house-made reduction.
- YieldThree pounds whole is two generous or three moderate servings once head, fins and frame are gone.
Colbert appears throughout French cooking as a name attached to a compound butter and to the egg-and-crumbed, butterflied fried fish called merlan Colbert; the label is generally traced to Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Louis XIV's finance minister, though the connection is honorific rather than documented and the garnish is a nineteenth-century restaurant invention. What is interesting here is the pairing: a French sauce laid over Spanish mackerel, a fish of the American South Atlantic and Gulf coasts that had no place in the Paris repertoire at all.