The 33 Best Fish And Shellfish, Local And Exotic
Every year on the thirty-three weekdays of Lent, we present a ranking of the best seafood around town. Some years we rank seafood restaurants. On others, we rank specific dishes. Three years ago, it was the thirty-three best local seafood species for the table. This year, the subject is all the seafood that we find in our restaurants, seafood markets, and our dinner tables at home. The list is dominated by local seafood--we live in one of the great fisheries of the world, after all. But it also includes favorites from other places. Salmon and scallops. Lobster. Mussels. Halibut. Our chefs prepare spectacular dishes with those fine guests from other waters.
The list is not a countdown, beginning with the thirty-third best and working up to Number One. Rather, it starts at the top. It's a measure of how superb our seafood selection is that even #33 is involved in many excellent local dishes.
#10: Redfish
Redfish has returned to restaurants in recent years, thanks to the success of redfish farms. I haven't had any wild redfish to compare it with (I'm not a fisherman, and commercial fishing is illegal in this state), but the quality satisfies my palate. Redfish is probably the most versatile of local fish. There's not a single preparation I can think of that I'd hesitate to apply to it. It's an exceptional fish for the grill. It's the best local fish of all for poaching. Poached redfish with hollandaise is almost too good in comparison with its simplicity. The same process with more flavorings in the poaching liquid results in redfish courtbouillon, a greatly neglected classic. Pan-sauteed dishes with redfish are terrific. Baked redfish--whether done with the whole fish or fillets, with or without toppings--are superb. Smoked redfish is wonderful. About the only thing I wouldn't do with redfish is serve it raw. (The fish is prone to parasitical worms which are harmless to humans, but they're still disgusting if you see one moving.) The most important thing to know about redfish when cooking is to eliminate any of the dark bloodlines that you might find. As usual, the smaller ones are better than the big ones.
Inferior Alternatives. When ordering redfish in a restaurant, ascertain whether it is actually redfish. Black drum is a close cousin and not an unacceptable substitute. Another is a Central American fish called Corvina, which even experts find difficult to distinguish from true redfish except that it has no black spot on the tail. The problem with Corvina is that, like most warm-water fish, it's highly perishable than usual, and it has a way of being a little over the hill when served. We might still have wild redfish were it not for the blackened redfish craze in the 1980s. To satisfy the demand, the commercial fishermen went nuts, even hauling in bull redfish. Those are the big, unappetizing breeding stock. The practice decimated the species' ability to reproduce. That problem has abated, and the numbers suggest that redfish could be fished commercially again--but the law hasn't changed. Yet. Write your legislator.
