Tonight’s Dinner

Many a young Jewish house-wife who delights in keeping the old Jewish traditions, shrinks from the task of making this supreme dish: stuffed fish. It has become legendary and she looks upon it with awe, surmising untold difficulties in the preparation. And yet stuffed fish is quite easy to make if one simply follows the instructions which one of our “Mothers in Israel” has jotted down for us.

Buy about a pound and a half each of pike and white-fish. Cut into slices about three to four fingers wide. Take the meat out, being careful not to mar the skin. Scrape the fish meat from the bone, then chop it fine or grind it by running it through the meat-chopper. Add pepper and salt, two raw eggs—for if you feel extravagant even three—cracker-crumbs to give the mixture body (during Passover week substitute matzo meal) and, if you have a Russian taste, very finely chopped onions, or a dash of sugar if you prefer the German way. Now take the mixture and fill the skin of the fish with it, tying each slice with fine white thread to hold it together. Put a layer of sliced onions in a pot—preferably an iron one—put the fish on this bed of onions, add enough water to cover the fish and let cook slowly over a moderate fire from two to two-and-a-half hours. Sliced carrots, put into the water cooked with the fish, are said to contribute to the general goodness of the dish, but even without them the fish thus prepared will be worthy to make its appearance on the table decked in honor of the incoming Sabbath.