image via mcsweeneys.net
The foodie ingénue must show no fear when presented a whole fish. Leave it lying on its side and eat the top fillet, right down to the bones. When that meat is gone, lift slowly from the tail and watch as the spine lifts all those tiny attached bones out from the bottom fillet, taking the head with it. Then toss it aside like the perfectly cleaned skeleton that Sylvester the Cat would leave behind. It’s that easy, and it’s totally hot (check out the stares).
Note the most derring-do use chopsticks.
Favorite part of the fish? That’s easy—every Sexy Mother Foodie worth her own tea-smoked sea salt knows that it’s the cheek. Just poke a chopstick behind the jaw and out pops a sweet morsel of meat. Try sharing it with non-foodie friends and watch them break a sweat.
If, on the other hand, one wishes to truly out-foodie another, she goes for the eyeball. (Be forewarned that this does not impress in Japan, where fish viscera is a fermented delicacy)
Kudos to Lucky Peach for taking fish-head chic to a new level: Last quarter’s cover features blood dripping from the (still attached) fish head.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Well said, sistah! I like my manifestos the same way I like my fish, raw and unadorned (if I ate fish, that is).
Being that more than a third of my last 14 years was spent living around Asia I ate a lot of fish, head and all. In business, I was often presented the head at dinner as the guest of honor. I did have one (short lived) assistant nearly faint when she was presented the head. I had forewarned her, but I guess she thought I was joking. Nothing like a little good cheek to set a night on the right path. Yum!
Love it! Yes, those sweet, sweet fish cheeks are a tender treat.
But were you ever presented a live fish to eat? I can’t say that this ever happened to me, but I do know people who know people who were faced with the flipping specimen on their platters.