Name: Red Mullet
Yield: Serves 6
Cuisine: United Kingdom
Ingredients: 2 medium onions, very finely sliced; 2 tablespoons (30 g) butter into which ¼ cup (30 g) flour has been worked; 6 red mullet; 1 small tin anchovies, drained and very finely chopped; ½ teaspoon nutmeg; ½ teaspoon salt; 1¼ cups (3 dl) red wine; 2 sprigs each of thyme, tarragon, lemon thyme and marjoram tied in a bunch or use a bouquet garni; ½ teaspoon white pepper; 2 teaspoons lemon juice; 2 hard-boiled eggs, finely chopped

Preparation info

Serves
6

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

English Provincial Cooking

By Elisabeth Ayrton

Published 1980

About

The red mullet has always been prized by gourmets although curiously it has never become an expensive luxury. It is sometimes called the “woodcock of the sea” because it should not be cleaned but cooked whole, with its “trail”, as a woodcock should be cooked. It is an extremely delicate fish, nearer to a fine perch than any other sea fish. In the 1850s the Duke of Portland, a notable gourmet, insisted that, taken straight from sea to table, it was the only fish worth eating and its liver an