Chars

After having cleansed them, cut off the fins, tails, and heads, and lay them in rows in a long baking-pan, having first seasoned them with pepper, salt, and mace. When done, let them stand till cold, put them into potting-pots, and cover them with clarified butter.

Eels

Skin, cleanse, and wash clean a very large eel. Dry it in a cloth, and cut in pieces about four inches long. Season with a little beaten mace and nutmeg, pepper, salt, and a little sal-prunella beat fine. Lay in a pan, and pour as much clarified butter over as will cover it. Bake half an hour in a quick oven; but the size of the eel will determine the time in baking. Take it out with a fork, and lay it on a coarse cloth to drain. When quite cold, season again with the same seasoning, and lay them close in the pot. Then take off the butter it was baked in clear from the gravy of the fish, and set it in a dish before the fire. When melted, pour the butter over it, and put by for use. The eels may be boned ; but in that case put in no sal-prunella.

Lampreys

Skin the lampreys, cleanse them with salt, and wipe them dry ; beat some black pepper, mace, and cloves, mix them with salt, and season the fish with it: lay them in a pan, and cover them with clarified butter; bake them an hour, season well, and treat them in the same manner as above directed for eels. If your butter is good they will keep a long time.

Smelts

Draw out the inside ; season with salt, pounded mace, and pepper, and butter on the top; bake them, and when nearly cold, take them out, and lay them on a cloth. Put them into pots, take off the butter from the gravy, clarify it with more, and pour it on them.

Pike

Scale the pike, cut off its head, split it, and take out the chine hone; strew all over the inside some bay-salt and pepper ; roll it up round, and lay it in a pot, cover it, and bake it an hour : then take it out, and lay it on a coarse cloth to drain, and when cold, put it into the pot, and cover with clarified butter.

Lobster

Boil a live lobster in salt and water, and stick a skewer in the vent of it to prevent the water getting in. As soon as cold, take out the gut, take out all the flesh, beat it fine in a mortar, and season with beaten mace, grated nutmeg, pepper and salt: mix all together, melt a piece of butter the size of a walnut, and mix it with the lobsterwhilst beating it. When beaten to a paste, put it into the pottihg-pot, as close and as hard as possible. Set some butter in a deep broad pan before the fire, and when all melted, take off the scum at the top, if any, and pour the clear butter over the meat as thick as a crown-piece. The whey and churn-milk will settle at the bottom of the pan; but take great care that none of that goes in, and always let the butter be very good:

Shrimps

When they are boiled, and shelled ; season well with pepper, salt, and a little pounded cloves: put them close into a pot, set them for a few minutes into a slack oven, and pour over them clarified butter.

Salmon

Scale a piece of fresh salmon, and wipe it clean, season with Jamaica pepper, black pepper, mace, and cloves beat fine, mixed with salt, and a little sal-prunella; then pour clarified butter over it and bake it well: take it out carefully and lay it to drain. When cold, season it again, and lay it close in the pot, covered with clarified butter.

Or, scale and clean the salmon, cut it down the back, dry ' it well, and cut it as near the shape of the pot as possible : take two nutmegs, an ounce of mace and cloves beaten, half an ounce of white pepper, and an ounce of salt; take out all the bones, cut off the jowl below the fins and cut off the tail. Season the scaly side first, lay that at the bottom of the pot, then rub the seasoning on the other side, cover it with a dish, and let it stand all night. It must be put double, and the scaly side top and bottom ; put some butter at the bottom and top, and cover the pot with some stiff coarse paste. If a large fish it will require three hours baking; but if a small one, two hours will do it. When it comes out of the oven, let it stand half an hour; then uncover it, and raise it up at one end, that the gravy may run out, remembering to put a trencher and a weight on it to press out the gravy. When the butter is cold, take it out clear from the gravy, add more butter to it, and put it in a pan before the fire. When melted, pour it over the salmon, and as soon as it is cold, paper it up.

Carp, Tench, And Trout

May Be Potted In Manner Already Directed For Salmon