[C. Parastromateus niger]
Black Pomfret
[C. Parastromateus niger]
Actually not a Pomfret but a Pompano (the two families look a lot alike), this is an Indo-West Pacific fish ranging from the north coast of Australia to southern Japan and from Africa to Borneo. It can grow to 29 inches but the photo specimen was 10 inches and weighed 12 ounces, toward the large size seen in the markets. Not all black pomfret are as dark as this one, color ranges to light gray. Though highly commercial this is a fast breeding fish and not considered threatened,
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This delicious fish provides light colored flesh with a very pleasant
flavor - mild but not bland. There is a dark strip under the skin but it
is not noticeably stronger in flavor than the light flesh. The flesh holds
together very well for all forms of wet cooking and pan frying but flakes
easily on the plate. Because the skin shrinks little it is an excellent
fish for baking or steaming whole or pan dressed. It is a very good shape
for cooking whole.
Buying: These fish are very commonly available in Asian markets. They come in two basic size groups, about 8 to 11 inches and 5 to 7 inches. The larger are usually on ice or frozen packed in foam trays, the smaller frozen in bags. Scales: This fish is completely covered with tiny scales with moderate adhesion. They scrape off fairly easily with only moderate flying around. Cleaning: this fish presents the usual problems with very deep bodied fish. If you don't intend to cook head-on you should cut the head off immediately (make cuts around the collar, then cut the backbone from the side) to make cleaning easy. If you will cook head-on, make the usual cut from the vent to under the jaw. The vent is directly below the root of the pectoral fins and the body cavity is mostly aft of the vent, so make a cut on one side of the fin from the vent back for about 1-1/2 inches. This should give you just enough room to get your fingers in. Use the bones as a guide because the flesh is tender and you can easily gouge out more than you intended. Use long nose pliers to pull the gills. Fillet: This is an easy fish to fillet with a coherent and easy to follow fin/bone structure, Outline the fillet by cutting through the skin top and bottom. Cut down to the backbone from front to tail, then over the tail and work forward. When you get to the rib cage you can pretty much pull the fillet off the ribs, or cut them from the backbone with kitchen shears and pull them from the fillet. If you will be using fillets skin-on, cut away the hard skutes at the tail. There are a lot of centerline spines but most are too fragile to remove and will pretty much disappear in cooking, but do try to remove those in the first inch because they will survive cooking. Yield: An 11 inch 13-7/8 ounce fish yielded 7-5/8 ounces skin-on (55%), 6-5/8 ounces skin-off (48%). Smaller fish will yield a slightly lower percentage. Skin: Taste of the skin is stronger than that of the flesh but still fairly mild, and the skin has almost no shrink. This makes it an excellent fish for pan frying skin-on and for baking, poaching or steaming whole. A skin-on fillet will curl noticeably when poached but not nearly so much as most fish. The skin can be removed by the usual Method but with more care and effort than with most fish because the skin adheres hard to the flesh. Stock: Heads (gills removed), bones, fins and skins make an excellent mild clear stock with almost no oil - one of the best for soup. |