The Matelote

Common-sense cookery for English hous... · Kenney-Herbert, A. R. (Arthur Robert), 1840-1916 · 1905
Source
Common-sense cookery for English households : with twenty menus worked out in detail
Status
success · extracted 12 days ago
Not a recipe
No
Ingredients (19)
For the base
For the fish and broth
For finishing the sauce
Instructions (9)
  1. Fry over a low fire at the bottom of a stew-pan in butter a dozen small red shallots cut up into very thin rings.
  2. Let them take colour, and then add the fillets, the broth, and a muslin bag containing a teaspoonful each of marjoram, and thyme, twelve peppercorns, and a blade of mace.
  3. Pour into the broth a couple of glasses of claret, close the pan, and set it over a low fire to simmer gently till the fillets are cooked.
  4. Remove the stewpan, arrange the fillets upon a hot entrée dish, empty the broth into a clean saucepan through a strainer.
  5. Add to its piquancy with a dessertspoonful of anchovy vinegar or a teaspoonful of reduced vinegar (page 65), with one of tomato ketchup and one of marsala.
  6. Thicken this with half an ounce of butter and half an ounce of flour (or more according to the quantity of broth) and pour it over the fillets.
  7. If you can put in with the fillets to begin with a pint or half a pint measure of carefully picked sea-water shrimps, so much the better; and on special occasions a few sauce oysters will add to the success of the composition.
  8. A seasoning of salt—one saltspoonful—should be put in at first: if after the thickening this be found insufficient add a little.
  9. The picked shrimps if used will contribute saltishness, so care must be taken accordingly.
Original Text
THE MATELOTE. Commence, after filleting the fish, and preparing a broth as in the former recipe, by frying over a low fire at the bottom of a stew-pan in butter a dozen small red shallots cut up into very thin rings. Let them take colour, and then add the fillets—say one pound of them—the broth, and a muslin bag containing a teaspoonful each of marjoram, and thyme, twelve peppercorns, and a blade of mace; pour into the broth a couple of glasses of claret, close the pan, and setit over a low fire to simmer gently till the fillets are cooked. Remove the stewpan, arrange the fillets upon a hot entrée dish, empty the broth into a clean saucepan through a strainer, add to its piquancy with a dessertspoonful of anchovy vinegar or a teaspoonful of reduced vinegar (page 65), with one of tomato ketchup and one of marsala. Lastly, thicken this with half an ounce of butter and half an ounce of flour (or more according to the quantity of broth) and pour it over the fillets. If you can put in with the fillets to begin with a pint or half a pint measure of carefully picked sea-water shrimps, so much the better; and on special occasions a few sauce oysters will add to the success of the composition. A seasoning of salt—one saltspoonful—should be put in at first: if after the thickening this be found insufficient add a little. The picked shrimps if used will contribute saltishness, so care must be taken accordingly.
Notes
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