To Dress White Bait

Modern cookery for private families · Acton, Eliza · 1845
Source
Modern cookery for private families
Status
success · extracted 13 days ago
Not a recipe
No
Ingredients (4)
Instructions (9)
  1. Do not touch the white bait with the hands, but throw it from your dish or basket into a cloth.
  2. Add three or four handsful of flour to the cloth with the white bait and shake it well.
  3. Put the floured white bait into a bait sieve to separate it from the superfluous flour.
  4. Have ready a very deep frying-pan, nearly full of boiling fat.
  5. Throw the prepared white bait into the boiling fat.
  6. The fish will be done in an instant; they must not be allowed to take any colour, for if browned, they are spoiled.
  7. Lift the white bait out of the fat.
  8. Dish the white bait upon a silver or earthenware drainer, without a napkin, piling them very high in the centre.
  9. Send them to table with a cut lemon, and slices of brown bread and butter.
Original Text
TO DRESS WHITE BAIT. (Greenwich Receipt.) [In season in July, August, and September.] This delicate little fish requires great care to dress it well. Do not touch it with the hands, but throw it from your dish or basket into a cloth, with three or four handsful of flour, and shake it well; then put it into a bait sieve, to separate it from the superfluous flour. Have ready a very deep frying-pan, nearly full of boiling fat, throw in the fish, which will be done in an instant: they must not be allowed to take any colour, for if browned, they are spoiled. Lift them out, and dish them upon a silver or earthenware drainer, without a napkin, piling them very high in the centre. Send them to table with a cut lemon, and slices of brown bread and butter.
Notes
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