Old-fashioned Potted Salmon (or Trout) with Mace and Cayenne Pepper

Old-fashioned Potted Salmon (or Trout) with Mace and Cayenne Pepper

One of the only disadvantages, I reckon, of living on the southern tip of Africa is that salmon don't live here too. We can buy salmon flown in from northern waters, but it's eye-poppingly expensive and often not that good, unless it's very wild or very fresh.

I'd rather spend my pennies on the high-quality trout that's now quite extensively (and substainably) farmed in South Africa.

I've mentioned Franschhoek company Three Streams's superlative trout before on this blog (here, here and here) and I've used it instead of salmon in this very old recipe. This will, of course, work perfectly well with ordinary salmon.

In this recipe, I've used a whole fillet of still-raw, delicately smoked trout (available, in South Africa, at Woolworths). Because it's already lightly smoked, it takes only five minutes to poach, but if you're using ordinary salmon, you may need to leave it in its cooking liquor a little longer.

This recipe (see original, left) dates from 1795, but is doubtless a lot older, as English cookery has a long tradition of potting meats and fish.

The recipe comes from a book called The New Experienced English Housekeeper  by Mrs Sarah Martin, which is available online at Google Books. In her admirably clear and simple instructions, Mrs Martin calls for an ingredient called 'chyan'. This had me scratching my head for many hours, and even a concerted search of Google didn't throw out the answer. After hunting through some other recipe books of the period, I eventually realised that she meant 'cheyenne' pepper: in other words, cayenne pepper.

At the end of this post you will find a slightly more complicated recipe for potted salmon - one I haven't yet tried -  which comes from the The Experienced English Housekeeper by Elizabeth Raffald (1786).

I was a little doubtful at first that smoked fish would taste good without a hint of lemon or any other sort of acidity, but once I'd tried this dish, I was quite smitten by the combination of lightly smoked fish, ground mace and cayenne. This is very good spread on slices of very hot buttered toast. (Have I mentioned that you can make excellent hot, golden toast using a sandwich press and thinly cut day-old baguettes?)

You can clarify the butter, if you have the time and energy, but this really isn't necessary if you're going to serve this within a day or two.

Mace (the hard filigreed case that encloses a whole nutmeg) isn't a spice that's seen in supermarkets these days, but it's well worth hunting down. I buy it whole from Indian spice shops and grind it to a powder using a mortar and pestle. If you can't find mace, very finely grated whole nutmeg will do, but use it sparingly.

I can't give you exact ingredients here: my advice is to add the spices a pinch at a time, and taste the mixture as you go along. You probably won't need to add extra salt to this dish, as I've specified salted butter. If you must use pepper (which I don't think is necessary), use white pepper.


Old-fashioned Potted Salmon (or Trout) with Mace and Cayenne Pepper

To poach the fish:
a large fillet of lightly smoked trout, or a nice fillet of raw salmon
2 bay leaves
a thin slice of lemon, peel on
6 black peppercorns, lightly crushed
a large sprig of fresh thyme
a pinch of salt
hot water to cover

To pot:
salted butter
freshly ground mace
cayenne pepper
bay leaves and sprigs of fresh thyme

Pull the skin off the fish and remove any bones.  Put the fish into a large pan and add the bay leaves, lemon slice, peppercorns and thyme. Add just enough hot water to the pan to cover the fish. Turn the heat on under the pan and poach very gently, in barely bubbling water, for 5 to 10 minutes (see my notes above), or until the fish is just cooked through, and beginning to fall into tender flakes on the outside. Don't allow the water to boil vigorously. Remove the fish from the liquid using a slotted spoon, cover and set aside to cool for a few minutes. Don't discard the cooking liquid.

Melt a slab (about 100 g, or one-fifth of a block of butter) in  your microwave oven, or in a small pan set over a medium heat.

Using your fingers, pull the warm salmon into big flakes and place on a plate or chopping board. Add the mace and cayenne pepper, one pinch at a time, and mix gently together using your fingertips. Taste as you go along. When the fish is seasoned to your taste, pack it lightly into a flattish dish (or several small ramekins) and moisten with a teaspoon or two of the liquid in which you cooked the fish. Pour the warm melted butter over the fish flakes, prodding the mixture gently with a fork so that the butter fills all the gaps. The butter layer should cover the fish to a depth of one millimetre. Press a fresh thyme sprig and bay leaf onto the top of each dish, and sprinkle with extra cayenne pepper. Refrigerate.

Take the dish out of the fridge an hour or so before you serve it, so the mixture can be easily spread.

Serve with hot buttered toast and a scattering of capers.



 Image above from The Experienced English Housekeeper by Elizabeth Raffald (1786).

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Frozen Flavoured Roux Mixture for White Sauce

White sauce (Béchamel) was the very first thing I learned to make at my mother's elbow. Not that this was difficult - a chimpanzee could master this in twenty minutes.

This French 'mother sauce', with the addition of grated cheese and a few flavourings, is so useful in all those heart-warming family staples: macaroni cheese, lasagne, cauliflower cheese, creamed spinach, vegetable tarts, cheese soufflé, ham and eggs, and so on.

Not that cheese is an essential add-on to this sauce: a thin, silken Béchamel enriched with cream and lots of chopped fresh parsley is heavenly with fish and gammon steaks, as is the salty, oniony version that goes with a plain dish of simmered-in-broth corned beef, carrots and potatoes (known in my family as 'Boiled Beef and Carrots, Carrots, Carrots.) Added to a rich, slow-simmered chicken or veggie stock it makes a most luscious soup.

The milky, benign gentleness of this sauce makes it a highly nutritious comfort food for babies and toddlers - pour it over cooked baby carrots, stir it into grated stir-fried baby marrows, or mix it with cooked macaroni, a tin of drained tuna, a handful of parsley, a dash of fresh lemon juice and a knife-point of mild mustard to make a tasty toddler-friendly fish bake.

Anyway, because I make white sauce about once a week, and am always looking for smart, time-saving shortcuts, I have devised this method, which involves making a large quantity of flavoured roux and freezing it in individual blobs. To create a white sauce in a jiffy, you heat a pan of milk on the hob (or in the microwave), whisk in the the frozen blobs, and a lovely thick white sauce is yours in minutes.

You can use ordinary butter for this recipe, but clarified butter or ghee will reduce the chances of your butter burning.

Frozen Flavoured Roux Mixture for White Sauce

1 block (500 g) salted butter, or the equivalent weight of clarified butter or ghee
3 bay leaves, torn into big pieces
6 whole peppercorns
4 fresh parsley stalks or a sprig of thyme
1 large onion, peeled and roughly chopped
2 whole cloves
500 g (about 2 cups, or 500 ml) white cake or bread flour

Set a large pan over a very low heat and add the butter, bay leaves, peppercorns, parsley stalks, onion and cloves. Stir frequently as the butter melts. Now allow the mixture to stew very, very gently (use a heat diffuser if you have one) for fifteen minutes. Turn off the heat and allow the mixture to steep for an hour.

Strain the mixture through a sieve into a clean bowl (you may need to reheat it gently first, if it's a cold day and the mixture is solidifying) and return it to the pan. Tip in the flour, turn up the heat, and cook, stirring constantly, for three to four minutes, or until you have a thick, briskly bubbling paste. Don't allow the mixture to brown.

Put a sheet of greaseproof paper on baking sheet. Using a large metal spoon, place large blobs (about 4 tablespoons at a time) of the roux on the greaseproof paper. Don't worry if a little fat seeps out from the mixture. Allow to cool, then cover the tray with clingfilm and place in the freezer for 8 hours, or overnight.

Prise the blobs of roux off the paper using a palette knife, put them in a plastic bag or lidded container and return to the freezer.

You can use this roux in its frozen state, or take it out of the freezer an hour in advance. Either way, heat a litre of milk in a saucepan and add a blob of roux. Bring gently to the boil, stirring frequently with a wooden spoon or wire whisk.

Once the mixture is bubbling, turn down the heat and simmer for three to four minutes. If the mixture seems too thick, thin it down with a little more milk or stock. If it's not thick enough, break another blob of frozen roux into pieces and keep adding these until the mixture has thickened to your liking.

Season with salt and pepper and add any other flavourings or ingredients called for in the recipe you're using - grated cheese, lemon juice, mustard, sauteéd chopped onions, garlic, nutmeg, mace, herbs and so on.

Each blob makes 1 litre white sauce.

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