During my boyhood in a small village in France, we were able to preserve a few foods past their seasons. We salted some, dried others, canned a few, and made sweet preserves with our small fruits. But these were really only makeshifts. For really good eating, we always looked forward to each food as it came into its season. Today, in this country, canning, freezing, and dehydrating have been so perfected that all perishable foodstuffs are carried an year round abundance. Yet we can never escape the fact that there are still some foods which lose something indescribable in delicacy or fine flavor when man tries to alter nature's plans.
One key to good eating is knowing when various foods are at their best. Vegetables, meat, and poultry are most tender and juicy while still young. On the other hand, many fruits are best when almost dead ripe, and fish when maturity makes the flesh plump and succulent.
One of the skills of a chef obviously lies in this knowledge of foods at their peak. If you wonder why certain foods always seem to be so good in first-class restaurants, it is because the chef serves them frequently when they are in season and at their prime. This is so easy it is hardly a trick. You can find out about foods whose seasons are unfamiliar to you either by reading about them or chatting with your grocer, butcher, and fish dealer.
Right now, in July, you should know that salmon is at its best. Of course, fresh salmon is in the markets during many months of the year, and the quick-freezing process extends its season over the whole twelve months. But I am speaking now of salmon at its high point of delectability, when its delicate pink meat is mast tender and moist and its distinctive flavor most subtle. It has been my experience that this prime salmon starts coming in from the West Coast in May and continues through July, just a little earlier than the Eastern salmon. The latter—most of it the famous Gaspé salmon of eastern Canada—has a season running from June through August. As you can sec, the two overlap during June and July, when the ample supply of fine specimens in all good fish markets should encourage salmon-lovers to serve it often.
Not only do the markets have plenty of wonderful salmon during these months, but the amateur fishermen are pulling in their share, too. I remember this was a favorite sport of the late Robert Walton Goelet, who built and owned the Ritz-Carlton and who was my boss for so many years. I could hardly forget his love for salmon fishing because of the hundreds of fish I repacked for him. Each week during the season, great wooden boxes filled with magnificent salmon carefully packed in snowy ice were shipped down from his camp in Canada for me to distribute to his friends.
Nor will I ever forget the telephone calls and messengers with notes from anxious households in which no one knew how to cook the salmon after they received it. It's pretty disappointing to be set for a piece of handsome, well cooked salmon and be faced with a broken-up mass of flesh, skin, and bones that have gone to bits in cooking—to say nothing of the embarrassment of the bonne ménagère. So here are the tricks to help the good housewife and her mate prepare salmon comme il faut.
I'll start with boiled salmon, probably the most popular way of cooking it and certainly convenient, because once cooked, it can be served in either of those two favorite dishes, hot with hollandaise sauce or cold with mayonnaise. The fish is cooked in a court-bouillon which is merely water seasoned and flavored with onion, celery, bay leaf, ct cetera (see recipe below). But the basic thing to remember is that the fish must be put into cold water—with its seasonings, of course—and that after it is brought to the boil, the heat should be turned down so that the salmon just simmers. Salmon flesh is extremely delicate, and if the fish is dropped into boiling water or allowed to boil rapidly, it will break apart. It is easier to handle and holds in shape better if well wrapped in cheesecloth.
The second trick is to leave the fish in the cooking liquor for a few minutes after turning off the heat, with the pan partially covered. This sets it, making serving and carving easier. If the salmon is to be served cold, however, remove the cover of the kettle when the court-bouillon has cooled a little, leaving the fish in the liquor until cold.
Boiled Salmon
To make a court-bouillon, put about 2 quarts cold water in a deep kettle and add ¼ cup vinegar or the juice of 1 or 2 lemons, 1 tablespoon salt, 1 onion, chopped, 1 carrot, chopped, 1 bay leaf, a little thyme, a few sprigs parsley, a few stalks celery, and a few peppercorns. Put in a 3- to 4-pound piece of salmon,bring to the boil, and simmer for 30 to 35 minutes. Turn off the heat and leave the fish in the cooking liquor with the pan partly covered for 10 to 12 minutes, If the salmon is to be served cold, remove the cover when the liquor has become warm and leave the fish in the court-bouillon until cold. Chill in the refrigerator after removing from the pan.
Another bête noire of many people is the problem of serving boiled salmon. I'm sure the tricks we use in the hotel kitchen will also help you in your own kitchen. The piece of salmon will naturally lie on one of its flat sides on the serving platter. If you attempt to slice straight down through fish and bone as you do when dicing uncooked fish, you are going to run into trouble as well as bones. The fish invariably breaks apart, and unattractively. Here is the correct way to carve salmon. Be sure all the water has drained from the fish before it is placed on the serving plater. Carefully remove the skin and the dark flesh next to the skin. (Although this dark meat is edible, it is very rich and oily and usually indigestible.) Dip a thin, sharp knife into warm water. Holding the knife parallel to the platter, slit the fish from edge to center just above the bones, to detach the flesh from them. Turn the platter around and repeat, working from the other edge to the center. The flesh thus loosened from the bones should lie in place and not be the least disarranged. To serve, cut through the top half of the fish just to the bone, making pieces about two inches wide, and lift up each piece (already detached from the bones) onto the plate which you are serving. When the whole top part is served, lift off and set the bones aside. Cut and serve the bottom section the same way, but slip the knife between skin and flesh as each piece is removed from platter to plate.
When cooking a whole fish, you really need a fish kettle—a long, narrow utensil having a rack to hold the fish and handles to lift it out. We call this a saumonière. But because a whole fish may curl in cooking and then not lie flat on the serving dish, here's another trick. Place it on a thin wooden board, the right size to fit on the rack in the kettle, wrap the board and fish in a piece of cheesecloth, and tie in place with soft string.
Boiled Whole Salmon
Clean a 10-to20-pound salmon, place it on a thin wooden board that will fir on the rack of the saumonière, or fish keltic, wrap the fish and board in a piece of cheesecloth, and tie in place with a soft string. Put this in the kettle with enough water generously to cover. For 3 to 4 quarts water, add ½ cup vinegar (or the juice of 2 or 3 lemons), 2 tablespoons salt, 2 onions, chopped, 2 carrots, chopped, 2 bay leaves, a few sprigs parsley. a few stalks celery, and 10 peppercorns. Bring to a boil and simmer gently for 1 to 1 ½ hours, allowing about 10 minutes for each pound of fish. Turn off the heat and leave the salmon in the water, covered for the first ½ hour, then uncovered, until the fish is cold. Lift out, drain well, and remove the string and cheesecloth.
Here is how to prepare the salmon for the buffet where it will probably be served. After the string and cheesecloth have been removed, take off the skin and the dark flesh from the top of the fish. Then very carefully turn the fish onto the serving platter so that the side you have skinned is underneath. Remove the skin and dark flesh from the side now uppermost. This is le roi du buffet, and frequently the king is garnished very elaborately with tarragon leaves, chervil, parsley, and chopped hard-cooked eggs. The salmon should be covered with aspic, and the whole chilled in the refrigerator. When ready to serve, garnish with tomatoes stuffed with diced cucumber, nests of lettuce with vegetable salad made of cooked peas, diced cooked carrots and turnips, tiny cooked siring beans, and small Limas, with halves of stuffed eggs and ripe and stuffed olives
The trick in coating the salmon with aspic is to have the fish very cold and the aspic so cold it is almost starting to congeal. Then as soon as it is spread on the fish, it will start to jell immediately. What aspic is left can be chopped and arranged on the platter between the garnishings. In serving, the salmon is cut like the piece of boiled salmon.
Salmon is always on the summer menus of fine eating places. Not a day goes by without at least one very large specimen on the cold buffet for luncheon. And we have had accidents, like the time there was a sudden demand for another cold salmon for the buffet only a few minutes after the first one had gone upstairs from the kitchen. What was that for, I wondered? Well, it seems that a piece of ice on the tray around the salmon platter had slipped under the platter of fish without the waiter's realizing it. As he carried the big heavy tray to the table, the platter started to skid on the ice, and before he knew it, platter and fish went sailing off the tray onto the floor.
In addition to the large salmon displayed and served on the buffet, we have often cooked weekly two to three hundred smaller salmon fresh from the Gaspé. These are boiled for serving hot with hollandaise and cold with mayonnaise and for such hot dishes as saumon Chambord, in which the fish is cooked in red wine, and saumon Joinville and saumon Admiral, two dishes in which the fish is cooked in white vine. But before I give you the recipes for these salmon dishes, let me give you a hint for telling when a slice of soiled or broiled salmon, sometimes called a salmon steak, is done. After about 12 to 15 minutes' cooking, test by patting the point of a small, sharp knife or a kitchen skewer in the middle of the round bone from which the smaller bones radiate. If you can lift out the bone without any of the flesh of the salmon with it, then the full is cooked.
Saumon Chambord
Melt 1 tablespoon butter in a kettle large enough for the fish. Add 1 medium-sized onion, chopped, and 1 carrot, chopped, and cook until they start to brown. Add 1 clove garlic, 2 shallots, a little thyme, 1 small buy leaf. 2 sprigs parsley, the peelings and chopped stems of 12 to 15 mushrooms, reserving the rest, ½ teaspoon salt, and a few peppercorns. Lay the fish on top of this and add 1 pint red wine and 1 cup fish stock or water. Cut a piece of paper the size of the pan with a tiny hole in the center. butter one side, and place the buttered side on top of the fish. This trick insures the fish's cooking on the top and the underside as well as keeping the whole moist and flavorful. Cover the pan, bring to a boil, and put in a moderate oven (350° F.) or on top of the range over medium heat. Cook for 35 to 40 minutes for a baby salmon of 3 to i pounds, longer for a heavier fish.
Meanwhile, cook the extra mushrooms in ½ cup water mixed with the juice of ½ lemon and 1 teaspoon butter for 5 minutes. When the fish is done, or when the bones separate easily from the flesh when tested with a knife, remove from the kettle. Discard the skin and ark flesh and place on a platter. Remove the mushrooms from their cooking liquor, saving the liquor, place them on top of the fish, and cover with a piece of warm cheesecloth.
To make the sauce, add the mushroom liquor to the liquid in the fish kettle and cook until reduced to about half the original quantity. Strain. Make a roux by melting 3 tablespoons butter, adding 1 tablespoon flour, and cooking together until the mixture starts to turn golden.Add the strained cooking liquor, mix, and cook, stirring gently until the sauce coats the back of the spoon. Strain through a fine sieve or cheesecloth and season with salt and pepper. For a richer sauce, add a little more butter, swirling it into the sauce. Coat the fish with this sauce and garnish the dish with 12 to 15 cooked shrimp or crayfish, with quenelles of fish decorated with pieces of (ruffle, and croutons fried in butter or crescents of puff pastry. called fleurons.
Another way of making the sauce is to reduce the liquor to half the original quantity and strain. Reheat and add beurre manié, made by creaming 3 tablespoons butter with 1 ½ tablespoons flour, swirling it in to blend with the liquid. Bring to the boiling point but o nor allow to boil.
Saumon Admiral
This dish is sometimes called saumon royale. Meh 2 tablespoons butter in a kettle large enough to hold the fish. Add 2 teaspoons chopped shallots and the peelings and chopped stems of 12 to 15 mushrooms, reserving the caps. Place the fish on top, add a few peppercorns, and sprinkle with ½ teaspoon salt. Add 1 pint white wine, or half wine and half fish stock. Cut a piece of paper the size of the kettle with a tiny hole in the center, butter one side of the paper, and place it. buttered side down, on the fish. Cover the kettle, bring to a boil, and cook in a moderate oven (350° F.) or on top of the range over medium heat or 35 to 40 minutes for a baby salmon or salmon trout of 3 to A pounds, allowing more time for a heavier fish.
While the fish is cooking, cook the reserved mushrooms in ½ cup water mixed with the juice of ½ lemon and 1 teaspoon butter for 5 minutes. When the bones separate easily from the flesh when tested with a knife, remove the fish from the kettle, cut away the skin and dark flesh, and place on a platter. Remove the mushrooms from their cooking liquor, keeping the liquor, place them on top of the fish, and cover with a piece of warm cheesecloth to keep the fish warm and moist.
Make the sauce as follows: Add the cooking liquor from the mushrooms to the liquid in the fish kettle and cook until reduced to about half the original quantity. Strain. Make a cream sauce by melting 2 tablespoons butter in a saucepan, adding 1 tablespoon flour, and cooking together until the mixture starts to turn golden. Add 1 cup hot milk and ½ cup cream and mix well with a wire whip as the sauce comes to the boil. Cook for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add enough of the reduced cooking liquor from the fish to make a sauce that coats the back of a spoon. Correct the seasoning, add a few drops lemon juice, and strain through a fine sieve or muslin cloth. For a richer sauce, mix 3 egg yolks with ½ cup heavy cream and combine with the sauce. Bring back to the boil. but do not boil. Coat the fish with the sauce and garnish with 12 to 15 cooked shrimp, slices of truffles, croutons fried in butter, or crescents of puff pastry.
Saumon Joinville
Follow the recipe for saumon Admiral but garnish a little differently. Combine cooked mushrooms, shrimp, lobster, and truffles, all diced, with Newberg sauce (see November, 1949), arranging these like bouquets around the fish.
Another way of making the sauce is to reduce the liquor to one-third the original quantity and strain. Reheat and add a manié butter made by creaming 3 tablespoons butter with 1 tablespoon flour, swirling it in to blend with the liquid. Bring to the boiling point, but don't allow to boil. If the sauce is too thick, add a little heavy cream.
There are a couple of tricks in making sauces that I want to call to your attention. When making any of the white sauces, the more you stir and whip, the whiter and nicer it becomes. But the brown or dark-colored sauces you should stir only enough to keep the mixture from getting lumpy and scorching, using a wooden spoon very carefully or merely swirling the pan as the sauce cooks. If you stir or whip vigorously, the mixture is lightened so much that it loses its rich, attractive color. Thus, in making the red wine sauce for saumon Chambord, care should be taken to stir as little as passible. while saumon Admiral or saumon Joinville are improved by being whipped well during cooking. Another trick to remember is that the sauce which is thickened with beurre manié should never be boiled after the butter is added. Otherwise it will have a floury caste.
In making hollandaise sauce or mayonnaise for boiled salmon, there are a few important tricks. Many a cook has ruined these sauces consistently without ever knowing why. The trouble is that egg yolks and butter (or oil in the case of mayonnaise) can separate almost before you realize it. leaving a curdled mass instead of a smooth, beautiful emulsion. The thing is to add the butter or the oil very slowly at first, increasing the amount gradually as you continue adding, and never to stop stirring for a single minute. For hollandaise, do not let the water boil in the bottom of the double boiler. It should barely simmer while you are making the sauce. Mayonnaise should not be stored in the refrigerator because the extreme cold will cause it to separate. (See page 60.)
The proper use of garlic is of special importance in French cuisine. Although the flavor, as we all know, is a strong one. the result of its use under a knowing hand is so subtle many people do not even recognize it as the flavor of garlic. This strange little bulb is used in most of the cookery along the Mediterranean. and in France it is often referred to as la vanille de Marseille. But you get the right flavor effects with garlic only if you know the tricks in handling it.
If you slice off a piece of the garlic bulb into your tossed salad and are not able to take it out because it has become lost in the greens, you will surely regret it. Someone always gets it in the mouth, an unhappy situation. On the other hand, if you chop up that piece of garlic, put it in the bottom of your salad bowl with the salt and pepper, and then crush it thoroughly with the back of a spoon until it is completely mashed with the seasonings before adding the oil and vinegar, you will find that no one will recognize the flavor at all when the salad is tossed. They will instead comment on the delicious flavor of the salad. Crushing and mashing seem to release the heavy flavor.
To prove how subtle the flavor of garlic is when properly handled, I can point to the situation of one of our guests, allergic to garlic in even a small amount. When she eats in our hotel, she always has to ask the waiter to find out whether the salad dressing, the sauce, the ragout, or stew she is ordering has any garlic in it. She wouldn't be able to tell by the flavor because it is so well controlled and blended, so she would find out only after she had finished her meal—and then unhappily.
There are some dishes in which garlic is essential, dishes in which it is used in large amounts to give a strong garlicky taste Escargots—French snails— for example, are always served with a butter sauce rich with garlic and parsley Bouillabaisse, too, depends upon garlic for its characteristic flavor. And most people like a little garlic in roast leg of lamb. If lamb is approaching the mutton stage, the garlic treatment is especially desirable. The trick is to cue little slits in the surface of the meat near the bony parts and to insert a thin slice of garlic. Or for a stronger taste, drop and crush the garlic with some salt and pepper and rub this mixture over the surface of the leg before roasting it.
The whole clove of garlic can be cooked in the stew or ragout, but I prefer to crush it here, too. After garlic is cooked any length of time in liquid, the strong flavor disappears and only a subtle overtone remains in the dish. Hut if there is a whole clove in the sauce. be sure to take it our, because anyone getting this in the mouth will find the full strength there when he bites bites through to the center of it.
For salads, garlic can be crushed as described above, or it can be cut in two and the bowl rubbed well with the cut side. Then when the salad is tossed, a very delicate flavor is imparted to the salad. The other trick is to put chapons in the salad bowl. These are small pieces of bread crust that ate rubbed with a Cat piece of garlic, and tossed in the salad. They can be discarded or left in the bottom of the bowl when serving, but that's a shame because they soak up a bit of the dressing and have a delightful flavor.
There is one trick with garlic that few people seem to know about in this country but which is fairly common in France. That is its use in seasoning an earthen casserole. Cut several cloves of garlic in half and use them to rub completely the inside and outside of a new casserole. This will harden and toughen the clay. Then fill the utensil with water and add onion skins, the tops of leeks. celery tops, paisley stems, and bits of carrot or any other vegetables. Put in the oven or on an asbestos pad on top of the stove and bring slowly to the boil. Let it cook for an hour or so. Remove. empty, and wash the casserole. It will never have the earthy taste that is often imparted to food cooked in a new casserole that has not had this seasoning treatment.