Gone fishin'

A Fricassee of Cod’s Sounds
When cleaned, cut them into small pieces, boil them in milk and water, and let them drain; then put them into a saucepan, and season with beaten mace, grated nutmeg, and a little pepper and salt. Add about a quarter of a pint of cream, with a piece of butter rolled in flour, and keep shaking the whole till hot and thick. Pour all into a dish, and garnish with slices of lemon.
Other recipes: Cod’s Sounds boiled. Another way, to make them look like Chickens. Cod’s Sounds broiled. Ragout of Cod’s Sounds.
The New London Cookery… London, 1827.

Broiling fresh Fish (foolscap paper in ashes)
Take a fresh fish; cut out the entrails, and without removing the scales, wash it clean; dry it with a cloth; put inside a seasoning of butter, pepper, and salt; wrap it in a wet sheet of foolscap paper, or several if necessary; cover it up in hot ashes. When the fish is done--strip the skin off and it is ready for the table. Send drawn butter to the table in a boat, to which add caviare, or any kind of catsup preferred, or serve with lemon juice stirred into drawn butter. The dish upon which the fish is placed should be hot.
Mrs. Hill's Southern Practical Cookery and ReceptBook. 1872

To Roast A Shad (Planked Fish)
Fill the cavity with good forcemeat, sew it up and tie it on a board of proper size, cover it with bread crumbs, with some salt and pepper, set it before the fire to roast it; when done on one side, turn it , tie it again, and when sufficiently done, pull out the thread and serve it up with butter and parsley poured over it.
The Virginia Housewife by Mary Randolph, 1824

To cure tainted Fish
Tainted fish may be much restored to its proper flavour by mixing a quantity of vinegar and salt in the water in which the fish is to be boiled.
New Family Receipt Book. New Haven: 1819

Helps towards the Preservation of Fish
If you would keep Fish long, kill them as soon as they are out of the Water, and take out their Gills; then fill their Heads as much as may be, with Pepper, and wipe them very dry, and pack them in dry Wheat-Straw.
Bradley, Richard. The Country Lady’s Director. Part II. 1732.

Divers good baites to catch fish with
Fill a sheepes gut with small unsleakt limestones, and tie the same well at both endes, that no water get therein, and if any pike devoure it (as they are ravening fish and verie likelie to doe) she dieth in a short time, you may fasten it to a string if you please, and so let it flote upon the water. Also the liver of every fish is a good baite to catch any fish of the same kind. Past made of wheate flower, a little saffron and some suger, and tempered with water, is a good baite...
Plat, Hugh. The Jewel House. 1594

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