Forgive yourself nothing, others much.
By Henriette Schønberg Erken
Klippfisk, our valuable and inexpensive foodstuff, is made predominantly from cod. Smaller quantities are made from ling, cusk, saithe, and haddock. Klippfisk is a highly concentrated foodstuff. 1 kg. of klippfisk corresponds to 2.5 kg. of fish in fresh, gutted condition without head and entrails. Klippfisk contains a great deal of protein and a relatively high content of iodine. If klippfisk is little used, it comes quite simply from the fact that people do not know how to prepare it as well and as variously as it deserves. The raw material is now available so appetizingly in larger and smaller packages, and in quite small ½ kg. packages in cardboard wrapping, as well as fine, whole fish. But has klippfisk consumption risen because of it? It is not easy to work away an ingrained prejudice. How do we usually serve it? As a rule either boiled with melted butter and chopped egg, or with mustard sauce, or as klippfisk pudding, often without egg! Full stop. And the pudding is often made from leftovers after a meal of boiled klippfisk; make a klippfisk ring instead!
However, apart from bacalao, there are fried and light dishes and a host of rewarding ways to prepare klippfisk. At least one klippfisk day a week is the goal.
So: See to it that you keep klippfisk in the house, both in town and country. Soak it out well. In the bottom of a dish or tub place an inverted plate, lay the cut-up fish on top, pour on water until it just stands over the fish, and let it sit for 2 days and nights. The brine that forms sinks down beneath the fish, which is placed in fresh, cold water 6—8 hours before it is to be used; the fish becomes somewhat softer this way. …