Take a short, thick fish about twelve pounds weight, scale it, remove
the fins, cut off the head with two inches of the jowl, and the tail
with six inches of the fish, these to be cured some other way. Lay
the fish open at the back, take out the bone, wipe nicely and scatter
sifted loaf-sugar over it; after lying six hours replenish the sugar
and leave it till the next day. Next draw your knife down the middle,
thus making two sides of it, which may by cured in different ways. Get
a pint and a half of recently picked shrimps, examine them carefully,
and pound them in a mortar with an anchovy, wiped and boned, and so
much of this mixture as you think sufficient――viz.
Cayenne pepper ½ oz.
Mace, in fine powder ½ oz.
Cloves „ 1 oz.
Bay leaves „ ½ oz.
Table salt 2 oz.
adding a little water that has been boiled. Make a nice smooth paste,
and cover the red surface of the fish with it equally; begin at the
head part, and roll it up into a nice firm collar, which bind tightly
with a broad tape, and sew up in strong calico or light canvas. Let it
remain thus two or three days, then plunge it into a pan of boiling
water, with saltpetre half an ounce, and salt one pound, to each
half-gallon of water; when done enough, take it out, set it on a sieve
to cool, and next day put it in your chimney with a slow fire, to dry
gradually, and then smoke it with
Beech chips 2 parts
Fern 2 parts
Oak lops 2 parts
for a week. When cool take off the cloth, and hang it up in a dry
air to get solid. It may then be enclosed in writing paper and sent
to table, and will be greatly relished. Let the thin side be treated
thus: Lay it down on the skin side, and cover it with rock or bay salt
in fine powder, sifted loaf sugar half a pound, and saltpetre half an
ounce; so let it lie forty-eight hours under a board of tasteless wood,
weighted down. Next wipe it dry, and hang it on your tenterhooks in a
free current of air twenty-four hours; mix well,
Essence of cassia ½ tablespoonful
Essence of cloves 1 tablespoonful
Essence of mace ½ tablespoonful
Essence of cayenne ½ tablespoonful
Essence of bays ½ tablespoonful
lay the fish down on the scaly side, and with a soft flat brush of
camel’s hair, pay it well over with the mixture, and cover with oiled
silk, or its best substitute, to prevent the evaporation of the
essences. Repeat this brushing over three times in twenty-four hours,
and roll it up from the head, binding tightly; expose it to a current
of dry air, and when ready to receive it, give it a fine firm coating
with gelatine composition, and keep it three months in a dry place.
It may be cut in slices for broiling, or if boiled let it be put into
_boiling_ water.