Spider Crab pasta a la Nigella & Spearo Dave

[spaghetti]

I don't care how long it is, this has got to be worth reading! :rofl: C'mon, 'fess up!

It's about a big fish that I would have speared, but didn't shoot because at that moment I had a smaller fish in the spear, gun unloaded and legs tangled in the line.
That splendid fish just passed me by. This fact flashed my mind about wasting chances or taking them, showed me the borderline between regret and happiness.

When three years ago I met the special woman who is now my wife (Dany) I was still messing up with the end of the story with my "ex" (Alex).
Alex and I were not married, but had been living together for five years and had initially planned to make one life in two. Then things didn't work out: different views and perspectives, no more kisses, no more romance, no more I love you's, only quarrelling and arguing every day for any stupid thing. After two years of crisis we were still living together, but had lost any hope that we could go on any longer.

One day we quarrelled ridiculously about the cat's hair on the sofa. I slammed the door and went to my parent's hometown on the lake. I arrived late in the evening and cruised to the nearest bar: vodka & tonics (plural), cigarettes, I just stood alone and didn't want anybody around.
But there I had to meet Dany, who was in town just for the holidays and going to leave the day after. We stood talking until five o clock in the morning. Just talking, with a magic understanding: charming each other, but with some mysterious kind of mutual respect which prevented us to waste that special encounter with a trivial sex thing.

I had fallen in love, we had been flashed, but the day after she wet back to her world and I was still undecided: try again with my ex, or leaping into this new feeling?

In this doubtful mood, the day after I slept till afternoon, and it was almost evening when I went spearfishing in the lake.

It was the end of october, one of the last dives of the season. And sunset was incoming in half an hour. Dive after dive, I ignored the small fishes swimming around, looking for something special to spear. But couldn't find, so when I realized that the sky was darkening, I lost the patience and shot a small 400 grams black bass: the slim 6mm shaft didn't stone him, so the fish had a desperate reaction and made a messy tangling of the line all around itself and my legs.

It was then, while I tried to untangle the fish with my unloaded speargun lost somewhere afloat, that THE tench passed me by: it was huge, wonderful, the green orange colour shining in dark water, the big lips smiling, mocking at me: "Sometimes you loose the big chances of life".

It was late evening in late season and I was 35, with a fish I wasn't intersted in tangling my line, gun unloaded, hopelessly dark.

I phone called Dany and told her the story: "That tench is you", I said. She laughed, I jumped in my car to get the big fish in my stringer.

(ok, nothing special, just my story )

 

[Huw]

wow...
a sign of true love

Huw

 

[foxfish]

Well Spaghetti my friend, from what I know of you, your story sounds about right. You Italians can make romance out of any situation. I look forward to hearing the story in detail around the fire when you & Danny visit us in Guernsey.

Huw it amazes me the different opinions you can read or hear about the edibility of certain fish.
I am a dedicated cook & mostly enjoy preparing meals for friends & relatives. I have on so many occasions played the guessing game with my diners. I will cook "fish of the day" for my guests, they will be served a variety of species that I have freshly caught. They will be simply fried as goujons in veg oil (although frying fish is not that easy to get perfect) & served only with mayonnaise. I can assure you most people mistake thier identities. For instance, mullet mistaken for bream, wrasse for BASS in fact because so many people think "sea bass" is the best tasting fish, they will pick the tastiest fish & call it bass!!! In other words, virtually all fish are edible but not every one prefers the same taste.
Buy the way wrasse are fine to eat & interesting to cook with. You can fillet a big wrasse as you would any round fish, you can scale the fillets & fry as you would bass but it will take longer to cook. Wrasse are solid muscular fish & the fillets tend to be thick for their length. If you remove the skin & cut the fillets into small pieces, you can fry with herbs & butter. The flesh will break up & become crispy if you stir fry. This is one occasion when you deliberately over cook your fish! The crispy broken wrasse is served on a cold plate with mayo & mixed salad. When you visit I will cook you some.

 

[Huw]

Foxfish...
It really is interesting as you say about peoples reactions to tastes in fish, with mullet mistaken for bream and wrasse for bass etc. and are spot on with the conclusion that not everyone prefers the same taste. For instance one of the most highly enjoyed fish to eat has to be Mackerell but i simply do not like it at all ( i can already feel the shock on peoples faces !). Another example could be pollack, personally i love eating this fish, but many friends and relatives hate it! When i am next in the water i shall keep an eye out for a nice wrasse to try your tips on. I never really tend to scale my fish, rather just crisp it and then peel it off once it is cooked, but i guess that the large scales on wrasse make this difficult? How would i go about scaling a wrasse? Is it easier to do as soon as the fish has been shot?

Going back to spaghetti's story, i love the fact that a thread that began with the topic of food, moves on to discussing love! Just Goes to show how close the two things are in our hearts!!! rofl

Huw

P.S: Foxfish - I will take you up on that offer when i finally get round to taking a trip in your direction!

 

[Mr. X]

Just out of interest... has anyone here actually tried eating a UK (rainbow?)wrasse or is it just an old wives tale that they are not good eating? I've caught plenty of big ones whilst line fishing off the rocks in Cornwall but always thrown them back.

Not rainbow but I have had Ballan Wrasse. It tastes much like any other white fish, although I had it poached - which is my least favourite way of preparing fish as it tends to loose the flavour & texture (I wasn't the cook). The texture was good, quite meaty (not as firm as grilled bass though) -- not bad at all. I had been told Wrasse are boney but I had big fish with big bones -- so bones were not a problem at all (other than cutting the thing during preparation - I used the saw blade of my big knife, & the cook cut it into steaks/discs ). The cook removed the skin - something I don't usually do but perhaps understandable given the bright colouring. Not keen on shooting wrasse but perhaps it might be worth trying one grilled or fried?:hmm I believe OMD occasionally has one (& it's not like he is short of bass or choice) and apparently they eat them on the continent too (no surprise there!).

I suspect the Brits not eating them is more to do with them looking rather nice & colourful & hanging around the shore & them being fairly docile (often but not always) - so not too hard to get one. Also the diet of some of the smaller wrasse includes parasites from other fish - so they are good to have around but obviously that might put some folk off (unlike rats found inside bass - as spearo dave mentioned recently & marine woodlice mentioned elsewhere). The diet of the Ballan is something I've been reading about recently -- they often eat molluscs (prob. crabs & parasites too?) but will take a fishing lure, suggesting they will go for small fish. Several rod fishermen have sneared at the idea of eating Wrasse but I notice that many sea fishing books (including the Portland tide time tables) include information on catching Wrasse ... perhaps they return them or use them for bait but I suspect many get eaten.

 

[spaghetti]

What is a Wrasse? I tried with my online english dictionary, but didn't find a definition to help me. I know there's a lot of species with that name.
May anyone post the latin name of the species you're talking about? I'll give you in exchange some italian recipies, if they exist, for this mysterious fish.

 

[dave]

I think wrasse are "labride" in italian. Ballan wrasse (the biggest UK species) are labrus bergylta.
I know plenty of people who like to eat them, and they make excellent fish soup.
On the subject of crab claws, although crabs can survive with their claws missing, I have never liked the idea of pulling them off and leaving the crab, as I'm sure its not very nice for them!
cheers
dave
www.spearo.co.uk

 

[Huw]

Spaghetti...

Indeed there are many different species with this name, in fact the family name for Wrasse is Family Labridae. The most common UK wrasse are:

The Ballan Wrasse (Labrus bergylta),
Cuckoo Wrasse (Labrus mixtus),
Corkwing Wrasse ( Crenilabrus melops),
Goldsinny Wrasse (Ctenolabrus rupestris),
Rook Cook Wrasse (Centrolabrus exoletus)
and the Green Wrasse (Labrus Turdus).

The biggest and by far the most common is the ballan wrasse and is often caught by anglers i have a feeling that this will be the most likely of all wrasse to have a recipie.

Somebody shoot me down if i am wrong, but i think that there is NO UK wrasse called the Rainbow Wrasse. This species does exist, but inhabits Mediterranian and Iberian coasts... it is VERY VERY rare further north.

Perhaps the local name for the Cuckoo Wrasse in some places in the UK is 'the Rainbow Wrasse' since it is Very colourful (perhaps the most colourful of all uk fish)... just a side thought.

going back to Mr X's point on what people do with wrasse...
A lobster fisherman once told me that the best bait for lobsters in winter is wrasse ( i remember him using cuckoo wrasse) and so maybe this is what the information in your fishing books is for.

Hope i have helped,

Huw

 

[Huw]

sorry... i just saw that dave has already covered the Ballan wrasse!

 

[Mr. X]

Great tale, well told Spaghetti! I can see why you are a journalist/writer. (I had a moment of realization midway up Half Dome in Yosemite valley ... with a clear mind everything suddenly became obvious. I like your story better though!).

BTW I was wrong re. the Wrasse we ate, apparently it was baked in the oven and not poached. Old Sarge knows more that a little about preparing seafood, so I should probably hold judgement on poaching.

Ballan Wrasse: http://web.ukonline.co.uk/aquarium/pages/ballanwrasse.html

[Those pictured on the above link are quite small ones, maybe 1-2lb? Although the one above looks a little bigger. They are often much bigger, and more brightly colour, like a bright red-orange leopard pattern. Strangely exotic looking for UK waters -- I think most folk are quite surprised when they first see one, I know I was].

Also checkout this link by Dr. Mike Ladle (Magpie recommended this excellent online fishing book on the Dorset thread) on Wrasse fishing.

Huw, I tried turning the crabs upside down (perhaps I had heard this somewhere before, certainly on the forum I have read several folk suggesting doing this to spear fish for dispatching) and it did help quite a lot. Perhaps the problem is they re-entered the water at the same time they got to the mouth of the net bag!

PaddyTheFrog provided quite a lot of good spider crab info. on the Cornwall thread recently too.

 

[foxfish]

What is a Wrasse? I tried with my online english dictionary, but didn't find a definition to help me. I know there's a lot of species with that name.
May anyone post the latin name of the species you're talking about? I'll give you in exchange some italian recipies, if they exist, for this mysterious fish.

I dont think Ballan wrasse live in the Med, the nearest you get are Tordo nero. You do get Rainbow wrasse, Donzella & Cuckoo wrasse, Tordo fischietto.
Ballan wrasse are very common in Guernsey, they are caught up to 4kg. 3kg is about my best, I shoot 2 or 3 a year which I hot smoke over Oak for 1.5 hours or I cook as explained previously.

 

[Huw]

Perhaps the problem is they re-entered the water at the same time they got to the mouth of the net bag!

rofl perhaps you are right Mr X!

When did you try out the spider crab method? I really would like to see some pictures of spider crabs caught by you guys so that i know what size you are getting... i will try to get some pictures up over the weekend too.


Huw

 

[dave]

Another trick when handling spider crabs; If you tap them on the underside of the shell, they will quickly fold all their legs in, making them much easier to get in a bag
cheers
dave
www.spearo.co.uk

 

[Spaniard]

Just out of interest... has anyone here actually tried eating a UK (rainbow?)wrasse or is it just an old wives tale that they are not good eating? I've caught plenty of big ones whilst line fishing off the rocks in Cornwall but always thrown them back.

I believe that in the Channel Islands baked wrasse is a local speciality. However the fact that wrasse is an essential part of a bouillabaise should indicate their 'foodworthiness'. I've never tried wrasse (on its own) myself but have had many bouillabaise. They are also good for making fish stock.

 

[Mr. X]

...However the fact that wrasse is an essential part of a bouillabaise should indicate their 'foodworthiness'. I've never tried wrasse (on its own) myself but have had many bouillabaise. They are also good for making fish stock.

mmm...Sounds interesting...do you have a recipe? (I did a quick search & found this ... looks interesting: http://recipes.epicurean.com/recipe/17125/bouillabaise-french-seafood-stew.html ).

 

[Spaniard]

I don't have a recipe to hand but if you watched the Rick Stein French Odyssey series, in episode 10 he arrives at Marseilles and is shown how to make a 'typical' bouillabaise by a top local chef. The chef is seen making an initial 'stock' using a whole basket of various small fish including wrasse and rockfish etc. These are boiled down into a pulp which is passes through a mechanical strainer which in turn gave the Chef the 'base' for his bouillabaise.

Most web recipes I've seen are all different to each other based on what fish are available locally.

 

[Mr. X]

rofl perhaps you are right Mr X!

When did you try out the spider crab method? I really would like to see some pictures of spider crabs caught by you guys so that i know what size you are getting... i will try to get some pictures up over the weekend too.


Huw

Huw, I used it the week before I wrote the article. The mesh on my bag is quite coarse & knotted - perhaps I should try my spare bag, which has a finer, smoother mesh and a purse-type clasp & handle top, rather than a draw cord. I got another crab yesterday. The shell is the same or possibly smaller than the earlier crabs but the legs & claws are really long (perhaps that makes the shell seem smaller?).

I'm afraid I don't have a digital camera. Although others I go with sometimes take theirs, they're usually too busy enjoying the beach to take pictures of my catches (rather frustrating occasionally). I realised years ago that I have v. few pictures of my best days climbing - & those I have were often taken by others...when you have a great, focused day you often forget about such things...until much later.

However, somebody in Cornwall put an image up of a huge spider recently (I can't find it now). None of mine were that big.