pecunium

A couple of weeks ago CG decided she wanted fish for supper. Specifically she wanted something high in Omega 3 fatty acids. Salmon is top of the mark, but I don’t care for it cooked (link to old post). Doing some research we found sardines are pretty good too.

Like mushrooms I’ve always thought I should like more of them then I do. Reading accounts of people eating (say Preserved Killick frying up pan after pan of fresh flying fish, or mackerels, etc.) makes me drool, but the real thing, not so much). We decided to be adventurous and began to call around for fresh sardines. Sardines because I like mackerel, and because I’ve used them (and more generic kippers) in the making of (insert post about sandwich)

No place had them. The only recommendations we got were for places in San Francisco. Feh. In the course of a rainy day we decided the hell with it (because the mackerel we found in various parts of the search, was all frozen), and swung by Whole Foods to get a steak.

Lo, and Behold, they had fresh sardines. The fishmonger was amused at our description of the search, telling us they get 20 lbs of them everyday from Monterey (which fishery the proximity of had caused me to think finding fresh sardines would be almost trivial). When she found we’d never had one, she gave us the one we’d asked for as a lagniappe.

I took it to her house, taught her how to gut/clean/butterfly them and tossed it in a pan, with a bit of olive oil. The three of us thought it was a swell idea.

The meat was firm, with a bit of the tooth one gets from good canned tuna. The browned bits (esp. near the tail, where the flesh was more done) were sweet, and crunchy.

But one wasn’t enough. So CG found a Moroccan recipe, basically a condiment (parsley, onions, garlic, cumin, lemon juice, paprika) which was to be used as the filling in a “sandwich”. We headed back to Whole Foods, and thanked the fishmonger for the sardine. She and I talked about gutting/filleting. Because of the issues of time/volume (it’s about 6 sardines to a lb) they will gut, and remove the heads and tails, but boning is left to the buyer.

I told her it was easy, remove the head, and tail, flop the cleaned fish open, and place the heel of a knife beneath the spine (at the tail end), slide a bit toward the head (so at least one, two is better, vertebra is on the blade), pinch the spine to the knife, and lift. Me, I do it with my fingers, pinching the spine and then lifting. The dorsal spines will want to be peeled out, which may give you two fillets, or they can be ignored; providing a small bit of crunch.

She seemed to be taking a long time to clean 6 fish (I was being lazy, which is how we got to the conversation on filleting sardines), and brought out 6 butterflied fish. She said she had the time, so she’d felt like trying it. She agreed, it is easy.

They were a bit of a disappointment. The garnish was too pungent for the fish. I reduced the cumin, and the paprika, and it was still very forward. Sardines, contrary to general expectation/understanding, are not really strongly flavored, poorly canned ones are as strong as they get, and they are still pleasant spread on toast with a bit of butter.

Tonight we try it again. This time closer to the first time. Butterflied fish, pan-fried in olive oil, and dressed with caper butter. A side salad (romaine, tomatoes, english cucumbers and minced shallots, asparagus; pan fried in bacon fat), Rice and a gewürtzraminer.

For everyone else I tossed the asparagus with the crispy bacon from rendering fresh fat for the asparagus. Me, I was feeling the need for different variety, and used the bacon in the rice.

The verdict is... cook them more than you think is ideal; they are oily, and can take it. Get them crispy brown on the flesh side, and then flip them for a moment to crisp the skins a bit et voila