The Top Fishing
Chapter 309 - 173: Money Fish_4

Chapter 309: Chapter 173: Money Fish_4

The main reason is that the fish Lin Yang is serving was just caught, ensuring the absolute best in freshness.

"Mmm, indeed it’s not bad." Taking a piece of Yellow Sea Bream into his mouth, Lin Yang nodded as he ate.

In fact, whether it’s freshwater or saltwater fish, what you’re eating first and foremost is the freshness, which generally can only be guaranteed by a living fish. Even the tastiest fish, once frozen, will have a significantly worse texture.

Well... that isn’t to say without exception. For example, large tunas can’t be eaten fresh because their muscles are very well-developed. So, they have to be treated like beef, subjected to low-temperature freezing to remove the acids before they can taste good.

However, such fish are the minority. Most fish have white flesh, which doesn’t require acid removal, so maintaining their liveliness is critical. Even the most delicious freeze-caught wild fish doesn’t taste as good as a living farmed one.

Of course, if all fish are alive, or have died less than two hours ago, wild fish utterly trounce farmed fish by a long shot in terms of flesh quality, not even in the same league.

Actually, purely in terms of taste, Yellow Sea Bream and Black Seabream don’t rank very high among sea fish.

Among what Lin Yang knows, there’s a fish called Shajian along the southeastern coast of our country that is recognized as the tastiest. Note it’s Shajian, not Sardine. Its scientific name is Many-scaled Sculpin, which has the reputation for being the tastiest sea fish.

Unfortunately, he hasn’t had the chance to try it yet. But thinking about it now, he might give it a shot during this time.

Following the Many-scaled Sculpin, the second best-tasting fish is commonly acknowledged to be Ma You, scientifically known as the Four-fingered Horse Mackerel. In many places in Guangdong Province, it is also called ’Wuyu’ or ’Ma Wu’. It can be found in the Indian Ocean and the western part of the Pacific Ocean, and it’s not particularly expensive, but the taste is indeed exceptional.

In popular sayings ’First Wuyu, second White Pomfret, third and fourth Ma plus...’, the Wuyu referred to here is the Ma You.

The third acknowledged tastiest sea fish should be White Pomfret, also known as Silver Pomfret. Some people sell Yan Chang as Silver Pomfret because they look similar, but the taste is quite inferior.

At this point, some might question, saying that even inland, Silver Pomfret is available in many supermarkets, many have tried it and didn’t think it tasted that great.

Those who say that are strongly recommended to take a trip to the real seaside, to go out to sea once, and if possible, to try freshly caught Silver Pomfret. If that’s not possible, then pick those caught by sea fishing. If not available, they could settle for fish caught with long lines. And if even those are not accessible, fish from small boats will do. If one can’t get fish from small boats, then there’s nothing worth tasting.

Because with trawling ships, unless the fish are alive when they’re brought ashore, they’re no different than the frozen ones bought in supermarkets.

Since trawling vessels go out for at least a week or even longer, fish that are caught are immediately frozen, making them taste just like frozen fish, nothing special.

Of course, the chance of getting fresh fish from a trawler is slim to none, and even if there were any, they wouldn’t be as plump after so many days of starvation.

But there’s still a good chance for shrimp and crab.

Continuing with the previous topic, the fish recognized as the fourth tastiest sea fish should be Mian Fish. It’s not the fish itself that’s so tasty; it’s its fish maw, also called Fish Maw.

As mentioned earlier, the fish maw of Yellowlip Fish can sell for hundreds of thousands per catty, several times more expensive than gold. Their fish maw is not only useful but also tastes better than shark’s maw.

Following Mian Fish, some of the top-tier Groupers, such as Rat Spot, East Starfish, and others, also have excellent flavors.

Ranking alongside Rat Spot, East Starfish, and Red Spot is Stone Bream, including Spotted Stonefish, Black Rockfish, all of which have live prices comparable to those of Rat Spot and East Starfish.

Besides these, Su Mei is particularly tasty, but now it’s a protected species and off-limits to people’s palates. However, it’s said they’ve begun to be farmed, though farmed ones surely rank lower.

Excluding the fish mentioned above, True Sea Bream, Kelpfish, and other sea breams taste good too, largely because these breams are big, so their flavor doesn’t fall short of the Yellow Sea Bream they’re eating right now.

Thinking about all the delicious sea fish he has yet to try, Lin Yang can’t help but feel a craving at this moment.