To Dress White Bait

Ingredients

• white bait
• 3 or 4 handsful flour
• fat
• 1 lemon
• brown bread and butter

Instructions

1. Do not handle the white bait with your hands; throw it from your dish or basket into a cloth.
2. Add three or four handsful of flour to the cloth with the fish and shake well to coat.
3. Transfer the floured fish to a bait sieve and shake to remove superfluous flour.
4. Have ready a very deep frying-pan nearly full of boiling fat.
5. Throw in the fish, which will be done in an instant.
6. Do not allow the fish to take any colour; if browned, they are spoiled.
7. Lift the fish out and dish them upon a silver or earthenware drainer without a napkin, piling them very high in the centre.
8. Send them to table with a cut lemon and slices of brown bread and butter.