Trout

Trout is considered a very nice fish, and is in season in the summer. When fresh it is a fine flesh color, and its spots are very bright. To fry trout, dry them in a cloth. Score them deeply, and touch each incision or cut with a little cayenne. Dredge them with flour. Grate some bread-crumbs very fine, and in another pan beat some eggs very light and thick. Dip each fish twice in the egg, and twice in the crumbs, and fry them in plenty of boiling lard, or in a mixture of lard and fresh butter. When done, drain them, and send them to table with a dish of cucumbers sliced and dressed in the usual way, with vinegar, pepper and salt.

If boiled, serve them up with egg sauce. If broiled, eat them with cold butter and cayenne.

Stewed Trout

This is a dish for company. Mix together as much cold water and sweet white wine, in equal quantities, as will well cover the fish. "When done, take them out of the stew pan, drain them, and keep them hot while you prepare the gravy. For this, thicken the liquid with a piece of fresh butter divided into four, each bit rolled in flour; and add two or more well-beaten eggs, and season with powdered mace and nutmeg. Mix all this together, give it one boil up, and pour it over the trout, after they are dished for table.

Baked Trout

Having cleaned the trout, wrap each fish in a very thin slice of bacon, sprinkled with minced sweet marjoram, and seasoned with cayenne and mace. Inclose each fish in a white paper, cut larger than to fit exactly. Fasten the papers with strings or pins, to be removed before the fish goes to table. Lay the trout in a square tin pan, and bake them in the papers, which must be taken off when the fish are done; but serve them up with the bacon round them or not, as you please.

Salt Cod

The afternoon before the fish is to be eaten, put it to soak in plenty of cold water. Cover it, and let it stand in a warm place all night. In the morning pour off that water, wash the fish clean, and scrub the outside with a brush. Put it into a kettle with cold water sufficient to cover it well; and let it boil fast till near dinner time, skimming it well. About half an hour before dinner, pour off this boiling water, and substitute a sufficiency of cold. In this last water give the fish one boil up. Send it to table with egg sauce, made with plenty of butter, and hard-boiled eggs cut in half, and laid closely along the back of the fish, to be helped with it. Accompany the cod with a plate of sliced beets drest with vinegar.

Next morning you may take what is left, and having removed all the bone, mince the fish, and mix it with an equal quantity of mashed potatos, adding some butter, pepper, and raw egg. Make the whole into balls or flat cakes, and fry them in drippings or lard. They are good at breakfast. On every one put a small spot of pepper.

Fried Smelts

The smelt is a very nice little fish, which has a peculiarly sweet and delicate flavor of its own, that requires, to be tasted in perfection, no other cooking than plain broiling or frying in fresh lard. Do not wash them, but wipe them dry in a clean cloth; having opened and drawn them, (they should be drawn through the gills,) and cut off the heads and tails dredge them with flour. The frying-pan must be more than two-thirds full of boiling lard; boiling hard when the smelts are put in, so as to float them on the surface. If there is not sufficient lard, or if it is not boiling, the fish will sink and be dark colored, and greasy. About ten minutes are sufficient for the small ones, and fifteen for those of a larger size. When done, drain off the lard and send them to the breakfast table on a hot dish.

If you prefer retaining the heads and tails, dish them, alternately, with the heads up and tails down.