Fish

Edwin Pawlowski said:

"Virginia Tadrzynski" <[email hidden]> wrote in message

Quoted message said:

Always flounder, salmon, tilapia and catfish, over and over and over. I
tried croakers but the supplier sent bad ones and I sent them back. I

just

Quoted message said:

ordered mahi-mahi and monkfish to be delivered Friday, I have an order in
for sea bass and I am contemplating red snapper....none of these have been
in stock before at this store. We are north of Philly and a few miles

south

Quoted message said:

of Allentown, PA. Question for the lot of you is this: I need
suggestions. What are good 'marketable' fish? I'd love to put a whole
squid in the case just to catch the eye, but I don't want to take the $$
hit, because I know it won't sell. Any suggestions?
-Ginny

Congrats on the promotion.
The squid will sell if you have some Italian clientele. You didn't mention
swordfish and tuna; they are staples at our stores.

I'd introduce one new type at a time. The more adventurous will buy it, but
if you have more selection than adventurers, it may sit too long. Offer
some recipes too since there are a lot of un-imaginative shoppers.

Once you get a reputation for having variety, sales may really take off.
Good luck with it.

I agree with the swordfish and tuna, perhaps even halibut. You may want
to mention they are great on the grill, as it is that time of year.
Stuffed Squid is also good on the grill, but fewer people would be
willing to go to the trouble. The mahi-mahi is also very grillable. Put
up a sign that says "Swordfish steaks, great on the grill" or some
such.

As for changes, keep what sells, and rotate out the things that do not
sell to well. If you have regular customers, talk to them. Make sure
the area looks and smells good. I don't buy fish from places that smell
iffy.

Dean G.

kilikini said:

"Sheldon" wrote

Quoted message said:

Virginia Tadrzynski said:

Good news.....I got a promotion. I am now the 'Seafood Leader' at the
grocery I now work at (they call me Leader because if they called me
department manager they'd have to pay me more). Now the big question

for my

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

friends the foodies......

Always flounder, salmon, tilapia and catfish, over and over and over. I
tried croakers but the supplier sent bad ones and I sent them back. I

just

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

ordered mahi-mahi and monkfish to be delivered Friday, I have an order

in

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

for sea bass and I am contemplating red snapper....none of these have

been

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

in stock before at this store. We are north of Philly and a few miles

south

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

of Allentown, PA. Question for the lot of you is this: I need
suggestions. What are good 'marketable' fish? I'd love to put a whole
squid in the case just to catch the eye, but I don't want to take the $$
hit, because I know it won't sell. Any suggestions?

Serve clam chowder... or for that matter any seafood chowder - Chowder
of the Day!

Sheldonson Ovabisque

I could eat chowder summer/winter/fall/spring. I don't care. I absolutely
adore chowder!

Another great griller is mako.

Sheldon Chowder

Sheldon said:

kilikini said:

"Sheldon" wrote

Quoted message said:

Virginia Tadrzynski wrote:
> Good news.....I got a promotion. I am now the 'Seafood Leader' at the
> grocery I now work at (they call me Leader because if they called me
> department manager they'd have to pay me more). Now the big question

for my

Quoted message said:

> friends the foodies......
>
> Always flounder, salmon, tilapia and catfish, over and over and over. I
> tried croakers but the supplier sent bad ones and I sent them back. I

just

Quoted message said:

> ordered mahi-mahi and monkfish to be delivered Friday, I have an order

in

Quoted message said:

> for sea bass and I am contemplating red snapper....none of these have

been

Quoted message said:

> in stock before at this store. We are north of Philly and a few miles

south

Quoted message said:

> of Allentown, PA. Question for the lot of you is this: I need
> suggestions. What are good 'marketable' fish? I'd love to put a whole
> squid in the case just to catch the eye, but I don't want to take the $$
> hit, because I know it won't sell. Any suggestions?

Serve clam chowder... or for that matter any seafood chowder - Chowder
of the Day!

Sheldonson Ovabisque

I could eat chowder summer/winter/fall/spring. I don't care. I absolutely
adore chowder!

Another killer griller is mako.

Sheldon Chowder

Dave Smith said:

Food Snob said:

OmManiPadmeOmelet said:

Whiting is inexpensive and is most often sold fresh frozen.

Whiting is hardly fit to serve to my cat*. God, my mom used to make
that [censored]. She called it jack salmon. Even completly soaked with
lemon juice it was nasty. Like night and day compared to the bluegill
and crappie, which were the only other fish I'd tasted as a child.
When first I tasted good ocean fish, it was blissful.

I have had whiting a few times. A restaurant where were used to go for
lunches and dinners near where i used to work offered variations of fish
and chips. One of them was broiled whiting. It was pretty good. One of
the nicest looking dishes I ever saw in a restaurant was one my sister in
law ordered in Paris. It was a whiting that had been butterflied and deep
fried whole. It looked great and she said it was delicious.

Ewww. There is a reason why it's so cheap.
She probably thought the fish was delicious because she was eating it
in Paris, and I don't doubt it was pretty.

--Bryan

Food Snob said:

Quoted message said:

I have had whiting a few times. A restaurant where were used to go for
lunches and dinners near where i used to work offered variations of fish
and chips. One of them was broiled whiting. It was pretty good. One of
the nicest looking dishes I ever saw in a restaurant was one my sister in
law ordered in Paris. It was a whiting that had been butterflied and deep
fried whole. It looked great and she said it was delicious.

Ewww. There is a reason why it's so cheap.
She probably thought the fish was delicious because she was eating it
in Paris, and I don't doubt it was pretty.

Actually it surprised me. She is the reason I don't do group trips anymore.
There is always one in a crowd, and she had [censored] and complained about
everything up to that point.

I forgot to mention that the fish seemed to have been dredged in flour. It was
a nice even golden brown colour and was beautifully presented. It really
looked great. Every time I see whiting at the fish counter I think about that
dish she had there.

If I had known that my Prawn Linguini was going to be a bowl of buttered pasta
with five measly little shrimp sitting on top I would have ordered the same
thing.

Sheldon said:

Serve clam chowder... or for that matter any seafood
chowder - Chowder of the Day!

Good suggestion. You can get rid of the stuff
nearing the end of it's shelf life that way.

Virginia Tadrzynski said:

Question for the lot of you is this: I need
suggestions. What are good 'marketable' fish?

I haven't seen it in years -- and it's terribly
politically incorrect these days -- but I still
have fond memories of the best whitefish I ever
had. Orange roughy.

I recently learned an odd fact. This fish has
an extraordinarily long life time. The fish
I had could easily have been 50 or 75 years old!

I did some web searching a couple months ago,
and it is still being caught, though catches
are smaller and more regulated than in the past.

I want to thank all of you for your input. I am trying to weed out
what doesn't sell and keep what does. I ordered monkfish this week and
sea bass for next as I had two customers ask for it. I want to be
known that I can make special orders if the request is there, also, I
can get frozen whiting, orange roughy, swordfish and tuna......right
now I have frozen tuna in stock because the chain is offering it on
sale this week for $4.99/lb. versus the $8.99 it normally is. I have
what is dubbed 'previously frozen' shellfish such as shrimp, crab and
small lobster tails. None fresh. I have a proposition before the
regional manager to allow me to have a 'fish trivia' contest......some
obscure trivia where the customers answer and put the answer in a jar,
the first right answer pulled wins a pound of whatever is on sale this
week, say a prepackaged bag of 51/60 frozen raw shrimp (on sale this
week for $3.99). I am seriously considering asking my cousin from
North Carolina to check his father's files and send me copies of some
of his pictures.....my uncle used to run a bait and tackle shop and
kept pics of 'large catches'....such as 8' channel cats.

If anyone comes up with any other ideas....Please feel free to let me
know.
-Ginny

Ginny Tadrzynski said:

I want to thank all of you for your input. I am trying to weed out
what doesn't sell and keep what does. I ordered monkfish this week and
sea bass for next as I had two customers ask for it. I want to be
known that I can make special orders if the request is there

A lot of grocery shopping isn't on the list. It's impulse buys.
People need to see something, or the name of something, to make them
feel like they need it. I need one thing I go to the store, but I come
home with 3 or 8 things.

So you know what could be a neat idea? Post an attractive list of the
fish you can order for people, with how long it takes for the orders to
come in. And what season they're available. Then while people are
frowning at the tilapia in your cooler because they've had it three
times in a row, they could notice that dungeness crab and walleye are
in season in a month, or that you can get the big scallops within two
days.

I'd be all over something like that.

--Blair

Virginia Tadrzynski said:

Good news.....I got a promotion. I am now the 'Seafood Leader' at the
grocery I now work at (they call me Leader because if they called me
department manager they'd have to pay me more). Now the big question
for my friends the foodies......

Always flounder, salmon, tilapia and catfish, over and over and over.
I tried croakers but the supplier sent bad ones and I sent them back.
I just ordered mahi-mahi and monkfish to be delivered Friday, I have
an order in for sea bass and I am contemplating red snapper....none
of these have been in stock before at this store. We are north of
Philly and a few miles south of Allentown, PA. Question for the lot
of you is this: I need suggestions. What are good 'marketable'
fish? I'd love to put a whole squid in the case just to catch the
eye, but I don't want to take the $$ hit, because I know it won't
sell. Any suggestions? -Ginny

Ginny,

I get sick of hearing how wonderful salmon is when really and truly it's
just a mediocre fish that has been oversold in restaurants as fantastic
(just my opinion, mind you). Halibut and swordfish steaks are good choices.

Slipper lobster tails are much less costly than rock lobster tails but they
taste virtually the same. Sole is an excellent fish, but a lot of people
don't know how to deal with it because it's so delicate. It's also not
cheap.

A couple of other people have mentioned whiting and I have to agree, whiting
is a really good fish. The only way I've had it, though, is bone-in and
it's a bit of a pain. I'm not sure if it comes in fillets. It's very nice
and mild tasting, though 🙂

Jill

In article <[email hidden]>, "jmcquown" <[email hidden]> wrote:

G'day Jill,

I find myself in full agreement with this:

Quoted message said:

I get sick of hearing how wonderful salmon is when really and truly it's
just a mediocre fish that has been oversold in restaurants as fantastic

But friggin' trout is worse! And similarly oversold.

Quoted message said:

(just my opinion, mind you). Halibut and swordfish steaks are good choices.

Slipper lobster tails are much less costly than rock lobster tails but they
taste virtually the same. Sole is an excellent fish, but a lot of people
don't know how to deal with it because it's so delicate. It's also not
cheap.

I haven't caught a sole in decades. But, yeah, they're good eating,
if rather finicky to handle.

Quoted message said:

A couple of other people have mentioned whiting and I have to agree, whiting
is a really good fish. The only way I've had it, though, is bone-in and
it's a bit of a pain. I'm not sure if it comes in fillets. It's very nice
and mild tasting, though 🙂

Dunno about your whiting, but here in Oz there are two types,
technically referred to as "summer" and "winter" whiting. :-)

Both are small, but one is smaller (almost miniscule). I forget which
is which because here in the deep north of the deep south all whiting
are a bit of a gamble. They're often contaminated with a bad off-taste
we refer to as iodoform. Comes from eating some sort of tropical
seaweed I was told as a fisherkid. Luckily, you can usually detect it
by smell when you catch the things, so you can chuck them back.

Whiting are very partial to a seashell we know as "pippies". In fact,
if you can find some pippies for bait, and fish the sandbars at the
right stage of the tide, you are almost guaranteed to catch whiting
around here. (Can't speak for the southerners.)

Without iodoform, they have sweet flesh and very good texture. But,
being small, and with a lot of fine bones, it's really a pain in the
butt to eat the things (not to mention a hole in the throat if you
happen to swallow a bone). I would only consider eating them cooked
whole as trying to fillet one would be absurd.

Personally, I would prefer a slab of barra; or one of the reef fish
such as coral trout, sweet lips, and similar. While they may lack
the delicate subtlety of whiting, they're a damn sight easier (and
safer 🙂 to get a feed from, and bloody good to eat anyway.

Cheers, Phred.

--
[email hidden]

jmcquown said:

I get sick of hearing how wonderful salmon is when really and truly it's
just a mediocre fish that has been oversold in restaurants as fantastic
(just my opinion, mind you). Halibut and swordfish steaks are good choices.

Are you kidding? I love salmon. I had salmon steaks grilled on the BBQ for
dinner last night. Salmon is quite versatile but is so good on its own that it
doesn't need much done to it.

Quoted message said:

A couple of other people have mentioned whiting and I have to agree, whiting
is a really good fish. The only way I've had it, though, is bone-in and
it's a bit of a pain. I'm not sure if it comes in fillets. It's very nice
and mild tasting, though 🙂

I have had broiled whiting fillets in a restaurant. I would assume that a
restaurant would buy it boned rather than spend the time to do it themselves.

Phred said:

In article <[email hidden]>, "jmcquown"
<[email hidden]> wrote:

G'day Jill,

I find myself in full agreement with this:

Quoted message said:

I get sick of hearing how wonderful salmon is when really and truly
it's just a mediocre fish that has been oversold in restaurants as
fantastic

But friggin' trout is worse! And similarly oversold.

Quoted message said:

(just my opinion, mind you). Halibut and swordfish steaks are good
choices.

Slipper lobster tails are much less costly than rock lobster tails
but they taste virtually the same. Sole is an excellent fish, but a
lot of people don't know how to deal with it because it's so
delicate. It's also not cheap.

I haven't caught a sole in decades. But, yeah, they're good eating,
if rather finicky to handle.

Quoted message said:

A couple of other people have mentioned whiting and I have to agree,
whiting is a really good fish. The only way I've had it, though, is
bone-in and it's a bit of a pain. I'm not sure if it comes in
fillets. It's very nice and mild tasting, though 🙂

Dunno about your whiting, but here in Oz there are two types,
technically referred to as "summer" and "winter" whiting. :-)

Both are small, but one is smaller (almost miniscule). I forget which
is which because here in the deep north of the deep south all whiting
are a bit of a gamble. They're often contaminated with a bad off-taste
we refer to as iodoform. Comes from eating some sort of tropical
seaweed I was told as a fisherkid. Luckily, you can usually detect it
by smell when you catch the things, so you can chuck them back.

Whiting are very partial to a seashell we know as "pippies". In fact,
if you can find some pippies for bait, and fish the sandbars at the
right stage of the tide, you are almost guaranteed to catch whiting
around here. (Can't speak for the southerners.)

Without iodoform, they have sweet flesh and very good texture. But,
being small, and with a lot of fine bones, it's really a pain in the
butt to eat the things (not to mention a hole in the throat if you
happen to swallow a bone). I would only consider eating them cooked
whole as trying to fillet one would be absurd.

Personally, I would prefer a slab of barra; or one of the reef fish
such as coral trout, sweet lips, and similar. While they may lack
the delicate subtlety of whiting, they're a damn sight easier (and
safer 🙂 to get a feed from, and bloody good to eat anyway.

Cheers, Phred.

You really should spend more time down here on Earth, there would be so much
for you to learn.

--
Regards ......... Rheilly Phoull

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Slipper lobster tails are much less costly than rock lobster tails but they
taste virtually the same. Sole is an excellent fish, but a lot of people
don't know how to deal with it because it's so delicate. It's also not
cheap.

Also, most "sole" that is sold is not real sole.

--
Peter Aitken
Visit my recipe and kitchen myths pages at www.pgacon.com/cooking.htm

Peter A said:

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Slipper lobster tails are much less costly than rock lobster tails but they
taste virtually the same. Sole is an excellent fish, but a lot of people
don't know how to deal with it because it's so delicate. It's also not
cheap.

Also, most "sole" that is sold is not real sole.

Then what is it?

Most *Dover* sole served in the US is not Dover sole but it is sole or
some similar flat fish nonetheless... there are various types of sole
and similar flat fish, once cooked no diner can tell one from another.

sole
The popularity of sole dates back at least to the ancient Romans, who
called it solea Jovi (Jupiter's sandal), undoubtedly because of the
elongated-oval shape of this FLATFISH. Though a number of FLOUNDER
family members (such as Petrale sole, lemon sole, rex sole and butter
sole) are incorrectly called sole in the United States, the highly
prized true sole is found only in European waters. The best-known of
these is the Dover sole (also called Channel sole ), which is found in
coastal waters from Denmark to the Mediterranean Sea. The body of the
Dover sole averages about a foot long and ranges in color from pale
gray to dark brown on the top side, with the underside a pale beige.
Its delicately flavored flesh has a fine, firm texture. True Dover sole
is imported frozen to the United States from several of the northern
European countries and is available in better fish markets. Other true
sole include the thickback and the sand (or partridge ) sole, both
smaller and less flavorful than the Dover. Much of what is sold as
Dover sole in the United States is actually flounder. Sole can be
prepared in a variety of ways including poaching, steaming, baking,
broiling and sautéing. It's ideally suited for combining with other
foods and sauces.

© Copyright Barron's Educational Services, Inc. 1995 based on THE FOOD
LOVER'S COMPANION, 2nd edition, by Sharon Tyler Herbst.

Sheldon

Dave Smith said:

jmcquown said:

I get sick of hearing how wonderful salmon is when really and truly it's
just a mediocre fish that has been oversold in restaurants as fantastic
(just my opinion, mind you). Halibut and swordfish steaks are good choices.

Are you kidding? I love salmon. I had salmon steaks grilled on the BBQ for
dinner last night. Salmon is quite versatile but is so good on its own that it
doesn't need much done to it.

And all salmon is not created equal. Buy some fresh and wild caught
Copper River salmon when available.. nothing like farm raised. Be sure not
to overcook it. Leave a nice translucent center. I rarely buy farmed
raised salmon.

In article <[email hidden]>,

(Phred) said:

G'day Jill,

I find myself in full agreement with this:

Quoted message said:

I get sick of hearing how wonderful salmon is when really and truly it's
just a mediocre fish that has been oversold in restaurants as fantastic

Maybe it depends on where you get your salmon and how fresh it is?
We get great fresh wild salmon here, and I love it. The frozen stuff,
and the farmed stuff, and that Atlantic salmon stuff is really bad,
though.

Regards,
Ranee

Remove do not & spam to e-mail me.

"She seeks wool and flax, and works with willing hands." Prov 31:13

http://arabianknits.blogspot.com/
http://talesfromthekitchen.blogspot.com/

Ranee Mueller said:

Maybe it depends on where you get your salmon and how fresh it is?
We get great fresh wild salmon here, and I love it. The frozen stuff,
and the farmed stuff, and that Atlantic salmon stuff is really bad,
though.

That's my experience as well, although here (California) there
isn't any fresh wild salmon yet, and they are predicting a delayed
season with a small harvest.

The best fresh/wild salmon available in recent weeks is imported from
Scotland, and is expensive.

For me, salmon is one of the best fishes for eating, particularly
if you like grilling it because it goes really well with a bit
of smoke infused in it.

Steve

Steve Pope said:

That's my experience as well, although here (California) there
isn't any fresh wild salmon yet, and they are predicting a delayed
season with a small harvest.

Here in the Pacific Northwest, USA, my local grocery just advertised
wild Alaskan Copper River Salmon. It is still ridiculously expensive,
but it usually is the first week or so it is offered.

Quoted message said:

For me, salmon is one of the best fishes for eating, particularly
if you like grilling it because it goes really well with a bit
of smoke infused in it.

I agree. I love salmon. It is strong flavored, so I can
understand why some people don't like it -- some people
don't like dark meat chicken either.

J

Steve Pope said:

That's my experience as well, although here (California) there
isn't any fresh wild salmon yet, and they are predicting a delayed
season with a small harvest.

Showed up here. Copper River salmon at $24.99/pound.

Not gonna happen.

--Blair