A guide to modern cookery

815—OTHER PREPARATIONS OF TROUT after the same recipe By proceeding exactly as directed in the foregoing recipe, and by substituting one of the following mousses for the “‘Mousse de Tomates,’’ it will be found that considerable variety may be introduced into menus :— I. Crayfish Mousse with fillets of trout, decked with crayfish tails and tarragon leaves. 2. Lobster Mousse with fillets of trout, decked with slices of lobster, coral, and chervil. 3. Shrimp Mousse with fillets of trout, decked with crayfish tails and capers. 4. Capsicum Mousse with fillets of trout, decked with strips of grilled capsicum. 5. Physalia Mousse with fillets of trout, decked with chervil, tarragon, and bunches of physalia around the fillets. 6. Green Pimentos Mousse with fillets of trout, decked with strips of green pimentos. 7. Early-season Herb Mousse with fillets of trout, decked with chopped, hard-boiled eggs, and chopped parsley. 8. Volnay Mousse with fillets of trout, decked with anchovy fillets, capers, and olives. 9. Chambertin Mousse with fillets of trout decked like No. 8. N.B.—In the making of ‘‘ Mousse au Volnay’’ and ‘au Chambertin ’’ the base of the preparations is supplied by cleared velouté, to which is added the reduced cooking-liquor of the trout. All these recipes are equally suitable for sole or chicken-turbot. 815a—ONDINES AUX CREVETTES ROSES Prepare a very delicate trout mousse, mould it in egg-moulds, and garnish the centre with trimmed prawns’ tails. Let the mousse set; then speedily turn the undines out of their moulds, and lay them in a deep entrée-dish. Between each of them lay a few prawns, the tails of which should be shelled. Cover the whole, little by little, with some excellent, half-melted jelly ; here and there add a few sprigs of chervil, and then fill up the dish with jelly, so as to completely cover the mousses. 816—FRESH-WATER TROUT The best are those procured in mountainous districts, where the clear water they inhabit is constantly refreshed by strong currents. The two leading methods of preparing them are called, respectively, ‘‘ Au bleu’ and ‘‘a la Meuniére.’’ Having already described the latter, I shall now give my attention to ‘‘ Truite au bleu.” This preparation is held in very high esteem in Switzerland and Germany, where fresh-water trout are not only plentiful, but of excellent quality. 817—TRUITES AU BLEU The essential condition for this dish consists in having live trout. Prepare a court-bouillon with plenty of vinegar (No. 163), and keep it boiling in a rather shallow basin. About ten minutes before dishing them, take the trout out of water; stun them hy a blow on the head; empty and clean them very quickly, and plunge them into the boiling liquid, where they will immediately shrivel, while their skin will break in all directions. A few minutes will suffice to cook trout the average weight of which is one-third Ib. Drain them and dish them immediately upon a napkin, with curled-leaf parsley all round. Serve them with a Hollandaise sauce or melted butter. N.B.—Fresh-water trout may also be served fried or grilled, but neither of these methods of preparation suits them so well as ‘‘a la Meuniére”’ or ‘‘ au bleu,’’ which I have given. SOLES. ; Sole may be served whole or filleted, and a large number of the recipes given for the whole fish may be adapted to its fillets. As a rule, the fillets are made to appear on the menu of a dinner owing to the fact that they dish more elegantly and are more easily served than the whole fish, the latter being generally served at luncheons. Nevertheless, in cases where great ceremony is not observed at a dinner, soles may well be served whole, inasmuch as no hard-and-fast rule has ever obtained in this matter. 818—SOLE ALICE This sole is prepared, or rather its preparation is completed, at the table.