James Beard's New Fish Cookery - James Beard [5]
DEEP FRYING
Heat the fat in your deep fryer to 375°. Dip the fish in beaten egg and roll in flour, corn meal, or bread crumbs. Place in the frying basket and lower into the fat. Cooking time will be approximately 10 minutes per inch of thickness. Drain on absorbent paper and season to taste.
Be sure the temperature of the fat goes back to 375° before frying other pieces of fish. Be careful not to overcook. Fish done this way can be deliciously juicy and tender or it can resemble sawdust. Deep frying is perhaps the riskiest way to cook fish.
BRAISING
This method is little known in this country but very popular in France. If you’ve never tried it, I urge you to make the experiment. The results are excellent.
Cut 3 carrots, 2 stalks of celery, 3 onions, and a clove of garlic into thin strips. Sauté them in 3 tablespoons of butter for 5 minutes. Arrange them on the bottom of a baking dish, fish boiler, or saucepan. Place your fish on the bed of vegetables, salt and pepper it, and place a few strips of bacon or salt pork across the top. Add enough liquid – red or white wine or a mixture of wine and fish bouillon – to half cover the fish. Let it come to a boil; either cook it very slowly on top of the stove or put it in a 350° oven. In either case baste carefully during the cooking process. The total cooking time will be about 10 minutes per inch of thickness from the time the liquid reaches a boil.
Fish cooked in this manner is usually served with a sauce made of the cooking liquid, put through a sieve and mixed with other ingredients. Sometimes part of the skin is removed after cooking and the fish is decorated with garnishes — mushrooms, truffles, pickles, lemon slices, anchovy fillets.
POACHING
Whether you are going to poach your fish in water or milk, or in any of the court bouillons in this book, the timing is exactly the same. Bring the water or milk to the boiling point; place the fish in it. When it returns to the boiling point, begin timing the fish. Allow 10 minutes cooking time per inch thickness for fresh fish, about 20 minutes cooking time per inch thickness for frozen fish.
Most whole fish are prepared with the head and tail on the fish, but scaled and with the fins run. For ease in handling, wrap the fish in cheesecloth. Leave long ends on the cloth to serve as tabs at each end of the fish and grasp these when you lift it.
Neither fish nor shellfish should not be left in bouillon after they are cooked. They will be overdone and tough.
When you cook fish in court bouillon, the critically important point to remember is that the liquid should never boil or bubble after the fish goes in. Do not discard the broth. It may be used for sauces, aspics, and in any way you use fish stock. If fish is left to cool in the bouillon, the cooking time should be reduced so as not to overcook.
SOUPS AND CHOWDERS
For these methods of cooking, see the section on fish stews, chowders, and soups (pages 42–62).
Serving Wine with Fish
Most fish dishes are enhanced by well-chilled dry white wine. This is neither rule nor ritual but simply a time-tested expression of popular taste and preference. Fish generally has a delicate texture, and its flavor is often elusive. Dry white wines, lacking the roundness and robust taste of the reds, improve the flavor of the fish but do not overwhelm it.
Not everyone agrees. If you are among those people who genuinely like red Burgundy with broiled halibut or sauternes with bouillabaisse, then these preferences are your own special pleasures. No one can say for certain that you are “incorrect.” If, however, you are serving fish to guests whose tastes are unfamiliar to you, probably the wise procedure would