Cod's Head and Shoulders

History

Mary Randolph's 'To dress a Cod's Head and Shoulders' appears in The Virginia House-Wife, first published in 1824. The recipe directs the cook to remove the gills and blood, salt the head-and-shoulder joint and boil it gently with 'a good handful of salt, with a glass of vinegar,' then strip the skin, brown it before the fire dredged with flour and basted with butter and white bread crumbs, and garnish it 'with a lemon cut in slices, scraped horse-radish, barberries, a few small fish fried and laid around it, or fried oysters,' finishing with lumps of lobster from the accompanying sauce. Far from a distinctly American invention, Randolph's text reproduces an established English recipe almost word for word: it matches Elizabeth Raffald's cod's-head recipe in The Experienced English Housekeeper — including the barberry, oyster and lobster garnish — with only trivial changes such as 'vinegar' for Raffald's 'alegar' (ale vinegar). This is consistent with the book as a whole, whose recipes were often 'little more than slightly-tweaked versions of well-established English dishes'. The barberries, oysters and lobster were thus part of the inherited English dish, not luxuries introduced in America. The record does not document any social-status meaning specific to this dish.

Ingredients

• 1 Cod's head and shoulders
• Salt
• 1 glass Vinegar
• Water
• Butter
• Flour
• White bread crumbs
• Lemon
• Horse-radish
• Barberries
• Small fish
• Oysters
• Roe and liver
• Lobster

Instructions

1. Remove the gills and blood from the bone and wash the head very clean. Rub a little salt over it and lay it on a fish plate. Throw a good handful of salt and a glass of vinegar into the water, then put in the fish and let it boil gently for half an hour; if it is a large one, allow three quarters of an hour.
2. Take it up very carefully and strip the skin nicely off. Set it before a brisk fire, dredge it all over with flour, and baste it well with butter. When the froth begins to rise, throw over it some very fine white bread crumbs. Keep basting it all the time to make it froth well. When it is a fine light brown, dish it up.
3. Garnish with lemon slices, scraped horse-radish, and barberries. Lay around it a few small fried fish or fried oysters. Cut the roe and liver in slices and lay them over the fish along with a little lobster from the sauce in lumps. Serve it up.