Broiling

“ If you will watch, you can see the air shimmering and rising from an open field on a broiling summer day, or wavering and rushing upward from a hot stove or an open register in winter. Hold a little feather fluff or blow a puff of flour above a hot stove, and it will go sailing up toward the ceiling. ”

“ Bluefish, young cod, mackerel, salmon, large trout, and all other fish, when they weigh between half a pound and four pounds, are nice for broiling. When smaller or larger they are not so good. Always use a double broiler, which, before putting the fish into it, rub with either butter or a piece of salt pork. This prevents sticking. The thickness of the fish will have to be the guide in broiling. A bluefish weighing four pounds will take from twenty minutes to half an hour to cook. Many cooks brown the fish handsomely over the coals and then put it into the oven to finish broiling. ”

“ Where the fish is very thick, this is a good plan. If the fish is taken from the broiler to be put into the oven, it should be slipped on to a tin sheet, that it may slide easily into the platter at serving time; for nothing so mars a dish of fish as to have it come to the table broken. In broiling, the inside should be exposed to the fire first, and then the skin. ”

“ Salmon, chicken halibut, and swordfish are cut in inch slices for broiling. Smelts and other small fish are broiled whole, without splitting. Clean and wipe fish as dry as possible, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and place in well-greased wire broiler. Slices of fish should be turned often while broiling; whole fish should be first broiled on flesh side, then turned and broiled on skin side just long enough to make skin brown and crisp. ”

“ In this state they always eat their fish, never broiling it for more than a few minutes; they broil also the fern root, and another root, of which the plant is not yet known; and they usually eat together in families. ”

“ And as for going as cook,—though I confess there is considerable glory in that, a cook being a sort of officer on ship-board—yet, somehow, I never fancied broiling fowls;—though once broiled, judiciously buttered, and judgmatically salted and peppered, there is no one who will speak more respectfully, not to say reverentially, of a broiled fowl than I will. ”

“ Instead of this, cover it with egg and cracker, or bread crumbs.
To Broil Fish.
Salt fish must be soaked several hours before broiling. Rub suet on the bars of your gridiron, then put the fish flesh side down (some say skin side down, as it saves the juices better) , and broil till nearly cooked through. Then lay a dish on it, and turn the fish by inverting the gridiron over the dish. Broil slowly, and never pile broiled fish one above another on the dish. ”

“ They have two ways of broiling, viz., one by laying the meat itself upon the coals, the other by laying it upon sticks raised upon forks at some distance above the live coals, which heats more gently, and dries up the gravy ”

“ The angler goes to the river in the early morning or the evening, when the fish will bite; the farmer makes hay while the sun shines; the miller grinds corn when the breeze is fresh, or the stream full; and the skipper starts when wind and tide are in his favour. By long experience farmers have found out the best time of year for doing every kind of work: seed is sown in autumn or spring; manure is carried in winter when the ground is frozen; hedges and ditches are mended when there is nothing else to do, and the harvest is gathered just when it is ripe, and the weather is fine. ”

“ If the soil about the waters be any thing moorish, it may be planted with osiers, which yield a certain yearly crop.
4. The feed of the pond when laid dry, or the corn, that is, oats, which you may have upon the bottom, though mere mud, is very considerable. This hath been touched before.
5. You will invite all manner of help to your fishing, by the fry given among those who assist you; and though you pay them, they will expect fish; and with expectations of carrying home a dish of fresh fish, men will work in wet and dirt, to a wonder, without other pay. ”

“ How to bring Fish, if any in the Pond or River, to the place you desire.
Boyl clean Barly in Water till it bursts, with Licorice, and a little Mummy; add some Honey and beat them together in a Mortar into a stiff Paste, and boyl about the quantity of a Wall-nut of this Paste with a quart of Barly till it grows Glutenous, and then lay it for a ground bait, and the Fish will flock about it from all parts.
To make worms for Baits come out of the Ground. ”

“ As for this stalling and over-feeding, what is it all to a sweet rational mouthful of summer grass, with now and then a cabbage or two, a gentle walk about the pastures, and at the heat of noon a foot-bath in the pond, away from the flies under the shade of a willow? That’s wholesome life; and makes good, honest beef—beef that’s a credit to the plum-pudding and horse-radish. ”

“ Stand, even as I have been wont to do for so many years, opposite our house on the bank of the river. Do not throw the bread to the fish before you have withdrawn the net. It is not fair to throw in the bread, and when the hungry fish come for their food to swoop down upon them and fill your net with them. First catch your fish, then feed the rest. ”

“ The herd, which before breakfast had been driven north to the river meadows, was returning to feed upon the young crops, and was dangerously near the river edge of the wheat. The cattle were grazing as they advanced, the cows leading and the beef cattle bringing up the rear. And when the foremost animals saw the youngest brother cantering toward them with the pack, they only hurried forward the faster so as to get a taste of the forbidden grain before they were compelled to turn tail. ”

“ Here, in a rocky hollow of the hills, a small stream wells from under the granite walls, only to lose itself a few hundred yards away in the sands and gravel of the wash. But, short as its run in the daylight is, the water never fails. And many cattle come from the open range that lies on every side, to drink, and, in summer time, to spend the heat of the day, standing in the cool, wet sands or lying in the shade of the giant sycamores that line the bank opposite the bluff. ”

“ But after a day's work in the harvest field, and fishing for eels off the rocks till nine o'clock at night, what time was there for Virgil or Graeca Minora? Sometimes he must draw up his nets in the morning before he went to the field; and the fish must be cleaned after they were taken. Sometimes a half day must be spent in going after fruit. And whenever the farm could spare him for a longer time, he was off to the woods with his gun; to fetch home rabbits at least, if no other game was to be had. ”

“ Then, when he has the bird, fresh from the river, he’ll heat up the rocks again, wrap the fish in leaves and put it into the oven, with hot rocks on top of it and under it, and cover the whole outfit up with leaves and earth. ”

“ What a thing it is to reap the wheat with your own hands, to thresh it with the oaken flail in the 44misty barn, to ride with it to the mill and take your last trout while it is ground, and then to eat it with no decoration of butter, straight from the oven! There is nothing better, unless it be to eat your trout with the virgin appetite which you have won in catching it. ”

“ Tiring at length of prospecting reefs, blows, and alluvial with no better result than an occasional pin's-head of gold, we turned our faces to the north, passing again the herd of cattle wallowing in the swamps and pans of rain water. ”

“ We encamped on this chain of ponds, having first crossed the channel, that we might have no impediment before us, in the morning; experience having taught us that the cattle could overcome a difficulty of this kind better when warmed to their work than at first starting from their feeding-place. ”

“ Men were at work here and there—for it was the season for ‘taking up’ the meadows, or digging the little waterways clear for the winter irrigation, and mending their banks where trodden down by the cows. ”

“ Down beats the hail like pebbles. It strikes upon the vines, scorches and blackens them. The wheat is leveled to the ground. The river suddenly swells into a raging torrent. Its turbid waters bear away the riches of the poor—the cow that served a little household and followed the children, lowing, to reedy meadows bathed by limpid streams—a horse caught browsing in a peaceful vale, thinking no ill—great trees hurling destruction with them. Rafters, roofs of houses, sometimes a battered corpse, float by. ”

“ The cattle are fed upon these [Pg 46] fish during the winter months. But it has been proved, which is very strange, that if, after they have been frozen for twenty-four hours or more, you put these fish into water and gradually thaw them as you do the meat, they will recover and swim about again as well as ever. ”

“ We've been reaping all the day, and we never will be beat, But fetch it all to mow-yard, and then we'll thank the Lord. 3 The barley, oh the barley, and the barley is in prime! All the day it has been rustling, with its bristles brown, Waiting with its beard abowing, till it can be mown! 'Tis the harvest and the barley must abide its time. ”

“ The trouble attending the capture is not great: the fishermen wait patiently and silently round the basins and labyrinths till the fish rise, when they are handed out with great celerity. The harvest, like the seeding time, lasts for three or four months, and all engaged in it are gay and excited. ”

“ The material traits may be summarized as: extensive use of salmon, deer, roots (especially camas) , and berries; the use of a handled digging-stick; cooking with hot stones in holes and baskets; the pulverization of dried salmon and roots for storage; winter houses, semi-subterranean, a circular pit with a conical roof and smoke hole entrance; summer houses; movable or transient, mat or rush-covered tents and the lean-to, double and single; the dog sometimes used as a pack animal; water transportation weakly developed, crude dug-outs and bark canoes being used; pottery not known ”

“ A hole is made through the ice, smooth and round, and the fisherman drops down his large hook, baited with a small herring, pork, or other meat, and when he ascertains the right depth, he waits—with fisherman’s luck—some time for a bite, which in this case is a pull altogether, for the fisherman throws the line over his shoulders and walks from the hole at the top of his speed till the fish bounds out on the ice. ”

“ He then goes and feeds his cattle, digs ditches, or lies down and sleeps as his business calls him. The oil resists the water for some time, at last the cake begins to dissolve, pieces fall off, the broken dates dipped in the honey flow down the stream, and the large fish below catch ravenously at them as they pass. ”

“ In the harvest field moved the figures of men piling stooks and leading horses and forking sheaves into the lumbering waggons—stooping and lifting, lifting and stooping with a rhythm that swayed atune to the wind across the wheat. ”

“ Fish may be considered as the staple article of food with which Providence hath supplied the inhabitants of this peninsula, who in general must never expect to draw any considerable part of their sustenance either from grain or cattle. It is true, the soil, as has been remarked, affords some good and nourishing roots, and every part of the country abounds in berries ”

“ A stream or pond will support but a limited number of fish, the number depending on the supply of natural food for both young and mature. By the supply of food on one hand, and the natural enemies of the fish on the other, a certain balance is maintained which if disturbed by, say, overfishing one season, will be restored by natural laws the next. ”

“ With luxuriant grass in plenty and the purest of water, with berries in abundance, with trout enough to feed many multitudes, and with elk, deer, and other big game all around them, there was no need for man or beast to go hungry. There was little excuse, indeed, for the cattle-stealing and other mischief they had begun. ”

“ For on the high chalk downs, you know, where farmers make a sheep-pond, they never, if they are wise, make it in a valley or on a hill-side, but on the bleakest top of the very highest down; and there, if they can once get it filled with snow and rain in winter, the blessed dews of night will keep some water in it all the summer through, while the ponds below are utterly dried up. ”

“ The heavy beeves naturally walked back and forth, up and down, the sand just moist enough to aggravate them after a day’s travel under a July sun. But the tramping soon agitated the sands, and within half an hour after the herd had entered the dry creek the water arose in pools, and the cattle drank to their hearts’ content. As dew falls at night, moisture likewise rises in the earth, and with the twilight hour, the agitation of the sands, and the weight of the cattle, a spring was produced in the desert waste. ”

“ Yonder the road curves languidly between hedges and broad fringes of green, and along it an old man guides the cattle in to afternoon milking. They linger to crop the wayside grass and he waits, but suddenly resumes his walk and they obey, now hastening with tight udders and looking from side to side. ”

“ They wind and waver, rise, drop and twist about the irregular semi-precipitous slopes with baffling eccentricity and abruptness. Nevertheless the cattle nose their way along blunderingly, but without hurt. Of no less importance in the open months, and the sole trade routes during winter, are the lower paths by the river. ”

“ I’m somewhat of an old fogy in those things; like the farmer with the jointed fishing rod and gold-mounted handle—he whips the stream all day and catches a trout two inches long while the kid on the bank with a switch from a tree, four yards of string, and a bent pin catches a dozen. ”

“ The field will contain tares as well as wheat, and both must grow together till the harvest; the net must gather into it bad fish as well as good, until the great day of final separation comes at the end of the world. ”