Page:Principles preservation fish by salt.djvu/21

Rh obligatory that the blood be removed. The blood can not be removed by mere eviscerating and rinsing in water. The kidney, a very bloody organ inclosed by a membrane against the backbone, must be scraped out before the fish is washed. If fish is cleaned in this manner and salt of a very pure quality applied in the dry condition, it is astonishing not only what severe temperatures it will stand, but also how excellent it is when cooked.

Several factors have now been shown to have a marked influence on the quality of fish pickled in salt, namely, care in handling before salting to prevent bruises, use of salt free from calcium and magnesium (less than 1 per cent total impurity), packing in dry salt, and thorough cleaning and removal of kidney and blood. By combining all these factors into one method highly satisfactory results under the most adverse conditions have been obtained.

A trial of the method was made in the herring season of 1920 (March, April, and May) on the St. Johns River, Fla. This region was selected because it offered a combination of the conditions sought. The climate is excessively warm, and there is an abundance of fish (alewives) adapted to preservation by pickling in a region where an industry might well be built up and where repeated efforts to salt fish in the past had failed. Accordingly, the interest of local fishermen and dealers was enlisted to cooperate in the undertaking, and an experienced fish packer from the Chesapeake Bay region was sent to Florida, after he had been thoroughly instructed in the technology of the process, to try salting by the proposed method on a small commercial scale.

The details as conveyed to the fishermen for handling the fish were: (1) Avoid (a) bruising the fish in removal from gill nets, (b) walking on, and (c) piling deep in boats; (2) salt as soon as possible; (3) wash and scale in cold water; (4) behead and eviscerate and (a) scrape out kidney or (b) split nearly through to the back and lay open; (5) wash in weak brine to remove all traces of blood; (6) rub with fine salt of a high degree of purity and pack backs down in a barrel, leaving fish lightly covered to form their own brine; (7) after they have been struck through pack down and add other fish of the same lot to fill barrel; and (8), in conclusion, (a) head up barrel and pour saturated brine into bunghole to cover fish for storage, or (b), if to be sold for consumption at once, take out of the brine and rub in fine dry salt, then pack in sugar barrels or other light containers and ship immediately.

The results fully justified expectations in every way. The fish were preserved successfully, and none that had been handled in the prescribed way spoiled. In eating qualities they were pronounced as good as or better than the best commercial salt herring from the Chesapeake Bay region. In order to test the absolute necessity of the prescribed methods, other small batches were put up in different ways–by using cheaper salt, leaving roes in, and other such modifications. These trials were failures without exception. About 80,000 fish were packed by the prescribed method and marketed the first year.