3 Blokes, a blender and a bag of chickpeas, learning to cook.
Be warned…scales fly everywhere & their transparency makes them hard to detect. The amount of times I was turned down for the last dance because the girl thought my face was on some Singing Detective flaking caper, I can tell you…
Pin the fish down by its tail on a board , & using the back of a knife scrape the fish from tail to head. Rub your fingers up & down the body to check for any rogue scales, the skin should feel smooth.
Tip within a tip…To avoid the scales-a-flyin’ do the above under a cold tap, collecting the scales in a colander underneath.
To gut a fish slit the belly open, cutting from its bumhole, up to the gills and pull out the innards. Rinse off any residue blood etc. with cold water.
Fins can be cut off with scissors, just open them up with thumb & forefinger & snip away.
Alternatively, don’t do any of the above & impress/shock/alienate your nearest & dearest by swallowing the fish whole.
We measure in pinches, punches, seconds and bra sizes. We love food, we just need to learn more about how to cook it.
redeye
July 22nd, 2006 at 12:29 am
Tried to think of a polite way to say bumhole and frankly even though bumhole was already mentioned I\’d forgot that it had and came up with something far worse, typed it, and then reminded myself of the bumhole as I was typing. So anyway, the small hole nearest the tail… ummm, yeh.
As it goes, this tip now means that I can pretty much eat fish as and when I like and save myself about 50% of the packet price, where they gut it and chop off its bonce.
It\’s the little things that matter.
jude
July 24th, 2006 at 5:29 am
the girl probably just told you that so you wouldn’t feel too bad about yourself…
hehe
maybe it was the fishy smell though…
jess
July 24th, 2006 at 7:31 am
Why would anyone who likes to eat want to scale and gut a fish? It’s carnage. And, I bet there were weird bits of organs clinging to the flesh that you were no longer interested in chomping.
Or, is that a chick thing?
redeye
July 24th, 2006 at 7:44 am
No dangly bits left at all, I think that’s why Pat made us do it under the running tap. The gooey bits just got flushed out as I stuck my finger in and ripped out its innards. Apart from it being cheaper to do it yourself, maybe its a man thing. Perhaps next week, we’ll hunt a herd of buffalo and and skin them with our teeth…
Pat
July 26th, 2006 at 6:33 pm
If anyone is considering a career as a chef get used to permanently smelling of fish & garlic & the sudden, subsequent diagnosis of Obsessive Compulsive Cleansing Disorder.