Jane Grigson's Fish Book - Jane Grigson [70]
SEDGMOOR EEL STEW
The landscape of Sedgmoor in Somerset is a medieval creation. Monks from such abbeys as Athelney and Glastonbury drained the marshes by digging long canals known as rhines (pronounced reens). A paradise for eels. Here is one local recipe, very simple and direct.
Allow 250 g (8 oz) of eel per person. Skin and cut it into appropriate pieces, discarding the heads as usual. Put the pieces into a shallow pan that will take them in a single layer – a non-stick sauté pan is ideal, or an enamelled pan. Cover with rough or dry cider. Simmer until tender – at least 15 minutes. Remove the pieces to a serving dish, seasoning them and seasoning the liquor. Mash together 2 tablespoons each of butter and flour. Add this mixture bit by bit to the simmering liquid, until it thickens lightly (you may not need it all). Put in a great deal of chopped parsley. Check the seasoning and pour the sauce over the eel.
You can make this dish grander in various ways. Serve the eel on croûtons of bread, as in Anguille au vert, p. 130. Reduce the cooking liquor slightly and enrich it with clotted cream before adding the parsley – this means you can do without the flour-and-butter mixture (beurre manié). But really this is a country dish: if you want something grander, I would go for the Anguille au vert and leave this recipe alone.
ELVERS see EELS.
FLAKE see A FEW WORDS ABOUT… DOGFISH
FLYING FISH see A FEW WORDS ABOUT… FLYING FISH
FOGAS see PERCH
FRESHWATER CRAYFISH see A FEW WORDS ABOUT .. FRESHWATER CRAYFISH
GARFISH see A FEW WORDS ABOUT… GARFISH
GRAYLING see TROUT
† GREY MULLET
Mugil cephalus and spp.
There are about 100 species of mullet spread about the warm and temperate seas of the world, a fact which may surprise you in view of their comparative scarcity at the fishmongers’. In the eastern Mediterranean, though, and in the Black and Caspian Seas, they are abundant enough to provide roes for Taramasalata (p. 530), and that piquant substance known as Botargo (p. 529), once prized by Rabelais and Pepys as a stimulus to thirst, but now difficult to find in northern Europe.
Our grey mullet is likely to come from the sea off Cornwall and the west of England during the summer and autumn months. The fish move in shoals, sometimes coming right into estuaries and ports where the brackish polluted water may give them a muddy taste. I have never experienced this with grey mullet, but if you have reason to think they have been caught in such places, wash them in several changes of salted, vinegared water.
Grey mullet, also known as striped mullet in North America and black mullet in Florida, looks a little like sea bass, silvery in colour, but clouded and pointed with dark grey. A svelte creature. The flesh is reasonably firm and delicate, the price reasonable. Its success depends on its freshness. Elsewhere in the world, the different species do not have the same muddy inclination and the fish is better thought of.
In Senegal, the cooks of Saint-Louis prepare a complexity of stuffed mullet. The fish is slit down the back, the flesh and innards carefully prised from the skin. The edible parts are chopped and mixed with breadcrumbs, tomato, garlic, parsley and chilli, then packed back into the skin, which is sewn together. The resurrected fish lies on a bed of tomato, fried potato, cooked carrot and turnip for baking. A tricky operation of a kind I am never tempted to perform.
The ways of Hawaii seem to me more sympathetic. There, mullet – amaama – may simply be steamed until half done, then gently finished in coconut milk. Or it may be made into little parcels and baked, see below. I have a weakness, too, for the Green Fisherman’s recipe from Pinocchio. He floured mullet and flung it into a huge frying pan of olive oil which smelt like newly-snuffed candles. It was part of a Fritto misto, which also included red mullet, hake, sole, anchovies and spider crabs – and nearly included Pinocchio, too – all freshly caught, straight from the sea. How good it must have tasted, absolutely delicious.