From GoEire.com
Liamog kelly from Ring
Catching up with Liam Kelly, seafood specialist with Curtze
Food Service's North Shore Seafood, is a lot like going fishing. Sometimes you
just have to wait it out. Kelly travels a lot with North Shore, covering more
than a half-dozen states, visiting restaurants and clients of North Shore. When
he's not on the road regionally, he's checking on catches along the coasts.
Kelly is
a fifth-generation fisherman, which he still considers himself, despite
spending more time on land than at sea these days. He left school at 12 to do
what he knows and is passionate about -- fish. So it was worth a bit of phone
tag (think of it as nibbles) to finally reel him in for some one-on-one time at
Frankie & May Fresh Grocer to help Lake Erie LifeStyle readers stop
floundering when it comes to ordering fish.
The full
interview will be in Lake Erie LifeStyle, in home-delivered copies of the April
28 Erie Times-News.
Kelly had
made a guest appearance at one of my fish classes at Frankie & May in 2012
and wowed the participants with just how great fish tastes. He cut thin strips
of the scallops so we could all get a taste of what a fresh scallop should taste
and look like -- not packaged in a container with milky liquid, which is a
chemical preservative.
For
Kelly, tasting raw fish is the best way to tell if what he is buying is fresh,
aside from a general look-see, which works for whole fish (you want clear
eyes), but is hard for those of us only looking at fillets.
At this
time of year, fresh flounder and sole are on the market and worth the price.
The fine, delicate flavor requires little more than a hot pan, salt, lemon
juice and maybe some butter. I took it a bit further with some herbs in the
flounder recipe today, but it's still little more than a half-dozen
ingredients.
Scottish
salmon is perfection and beats any Alaskan salmon (except the one my brother
caught) I've tasted. The reason is the time between the water and the plate. My
brother's fish literally went from the stream to the smokehouse to overnight
mail. Most don't. During the time between the water and the plate, the fish
deteriorates. And if it's frozen, the ice crystals will change the texture of
the fish.
So these
are two key times to keep in mind -- time of year and time from water to plate.
If you ask your fish seller or your waiter, he or she should know where the
fish is from and how long ago it was caught. If not, order something else.
