About Me
I'm a Melbourne boy, hailing from St Kilda with one ex, one current wife and four kids. Love the outdoors and making new discoveries. I cook a lot at home (cheers from wife) and do some preserving, mostly jams, pickles and fruit liqueurs. This is the diary of a cooking journey.

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Monday, October 30, 2006
The Quandary
We had our first fishing trip of the season yesterday. The wind had been howling only the day before which is not a good thing, for where we fish it stirs up the mud, discolouring the water, putting the fish off the bite.

Fortunately the water was fairly clean in most places we fished, though we didn't get the early start we hoped for as some fool (me!) left the bait behind. When we finally got our lines wet, things started going off straight away. Gummy sharks, flathead, a ling, one big whiting, a couple of rock cod and then something took off on my rod. After a short struggle up came a 2 kg (5 lb) snapper, Victoria's premier sporting (and eating) fish.

At the end of our trips, we always divide all the fish between us, so that someone who has not been lucky or doesn't fish well, doesn't miss out. But I had a snapper. Everyone wanted it, but there was no way this one fish could be divided up fairly between us. So in the final washup, the boys decided that my fish being worth more than theirs meant I got a lesser share.

I'm okay with that.

When I got home, D's eyes nearly popped out, it's not often I can bring home such a treasure.

"We can put it in the freezer for Christmas Eve."

"No way, I want us to eat it, how often do we get a snapper?"

She fixed me with a steely stare, "You know how important Christmas Eve is."

In some countries Christmas Eve is much more important than Christmas Day and D is from one of those countries. No meat is served for dinner only fish, however I wasn't done with yet.

"What about J, he's a snapper fisherman, he always gets one for Christmas Eve."

D knew I was right.

"If we eat it, you can't tell anyone."

So now we can eat the fish ourselves, but I'm feeling vaguely guilty. What would you do? Eat a wonderful fresh fish or freeze it to share in seven weeks.

I'm in a quandary.
 
  posted at 12:15 pm
  6 comments



6 Comments:
At 4:01 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Eat it. It's Monday. You can't buy fresh fish on Monday.

 
At 8:06 pm, Blogger lobstersquad said...

gather your snapper while you may. You´ll only get a tiny bit on Christmas Eve

 
At 1:18 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Neil, selfish is as shell fish does, but this is a shnapper sho why be slow, gobble it up before Santa gets it. Gregory

 
At 9:01 am, Blogger neil said...

Hi kitchen hand, you're right there, unles you catch it yourself.

Hi lobstersquad, good observation - a 2kg fish won't go far amongst ten or so people.

Hi bron, you're dead right. Because I catch it and sometimes there's a bit too much for one meal, we do freeze fish, but it's never as good.

Hi greg, nothing for Santa? Okay, I'll tell him it was your idea!

 
At 12:24 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

No quandry - I'm with Bron. I've only had the pleasure of having fresh red snapper (straight out of the ocean fresh) once, but no snapper I've eaten since then has even come close to comparing.

 
At 12:14 pm, Blogger neil said...

Hi ellie, I'm lucky enough to have really fresh fish a lot. No matter how many times I have it, it's always a pleasure.

 

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