SC - fresh eggs?

[Serian]

Jadwiga Zajaczkowa <jenne at tulgey.browser.net> wrote:
>I have. But it was fish, and it was in the US. Little crisp salted whole
>fish, fried. The concept sounded good, but they didn't get eaten, even by
>me, and I TRY everything.

In Indonesia there are several types of little crisp dried salted whole fish.

One common type is called "ikan teri" (that's pronounced EE-kahn TREE).

These are fairly crispy just as they are, dried, but usually they are 
fried with a paste of chilis or chopped chilis, shallots, and garlic 
and sometimes even chopped tomatoes, and served as a side dish, NOT 
as a course by themselves, eaten with meats, vegetables, and lots and 
lots of steamed long grain white rice.

My mouth is watering at the thought of Sambal Ikan Teri. I can post a 
recipe if anyone is interested. Of course, it isn't "period". I don't 
know of any documentation on "period" Indonesian food, although there 
are probably some texts written in Dutch or Portuguese from the 16th 
and 17th centuries.

I think there are similar small fish used in other parts of Asia, 
both Southeast and East.

And the smell of frying trassi/blachan/shrimp paste makes my mouth 
water, too. Sure the smell of a block of this stuff is a bit, errr, 
strong, but you only use a small amount to season the dish you're 
cooking. There are different varieties throughout Southeast Asia and 
China. When i lived in Jakarta, the woman next door began every lunch 
by frying a dab of shrimp paste and the smell to me is like the bells 
for Pavlov's dogs.

As for fish sauce, several cultures use it in Southeast Asia, and 
each has a slightly different variety. My favorite kind is Thai. My 
least favorite is Philippino. In Thai cuisine the flavor nicely 
complements the sharp and sour flavors of many dishes, and cuts the 
richness of coconut milk.

I grew up in a household in which the only fish we ate was canned 
tuna (in tuna salad sandwiches) and canned salmon (in salmon 
croquettes), although we did eat crustaceans (shrimp, real Maine 
lobster (back when they were big), and crab). My dad used to go 
fishing quite often, but we NEVER ate the fish he caught. My mother 
complained that fish tasted fishy. Once in a fancy restaurant in 
Chicago, where i'm from, my grandmother sent her plate of some sort 
of white-fleshed fish back to the kitchen because it wasn't browned 
(ugh!) - they brought it back brown and all dried out, as the 
customer desired (yuck).

I learned to cook fish after i stopped being a vegetarian. I'd cook 
it for myself sometimes when i was visiting my parents, and of course 
my mother just had to taste whatever i was eating. Soon i was cooking 
fish for her. I just did it simply, either in the oven or on the 
grill, with a little butter or oil, salt, lemon juice, and green 
herbs like tarragon. I cook it so it is cooked through, but still a 
bit moist.

I've since learned a number of different ways to cook fish and also 
eat a wide variety of stuff from the sea, including jelly fish, sea 
cucumber, octopus and squid, and shellfish, such as oysters, clams, 
scallops, etc. (well, we ate scallops in my family, but i don't think 
anyone knew what the live creature looked like).

But as someone commented, lots of Americans won't eat fish. And for 
some reason, if you let them see where their meat comes from - any 
kind, land, air, or sea - they're especially squeamish. I love 
Chinese whole cooked fish. So what if the head is on? I really don't 
understand the big deal. Just eat the meat and leave the head if you 
don't want to eat the cheeks and eyes.

Anahita al-shazhiyya