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1
Put enough cold water to cover the fish in a pot with the fish, carrot, celery, and onion, and bring it to a boil over medium heat.
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2
As soon as the water boils, remove from the heat and let the pot stand for 5 minutes, then remove the fish with a skimmer and lay it on absorbent paper to drain and cool.
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3
When the baccala is cool enough to handle, remove all the bones, a necessarily manual operation.
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4
Do not remove the skin, however.
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5
Put the milk in a pan over low heat, and heat it until it is hot, taking care not to boil or burn it.
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6
Meanwhile, crumble the baccala by hand and put it in a bowl.
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7
Use a pestle to pulverize the fish, stopping every now and then to whisk in, alternately, trickles of oil and hot milk.
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8
Go back and forth between using the pestle and whisk.
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9
Continue to beat tirelessly; the process should take about 15 minutes.
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10
Salt is not normally necessary, but do add some black pepper.
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11
If the mixture gets too cold to mix well during the mashing, reheat it in a bain-marie until it is sufficiently malleable.
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12
You should also reheat it until it's warm when you are about to serve it.
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13
Accompany it with croutons of fried white bread or fried polenta.
