The Closet Gastronome: February 2017

(media: pastel à l'huile / oil pastels on plain A4 paper)

“...If you give a man a fish he is hungry again in an hour. If you teach him to catch a fish you do him a good turn.”

— in Anne Isabella Thackeray Ritchie's Mrs. Dymond (1885)

Last Thursday (2 February 2017), we started with our seafood course—one of our courses for our final semester at culinary school this year. For our first lesson, we were introduced to an assortment of fishes found here in Australia and we were taught how to fillet several types of round fish. Below are the pictures I took during our seafood class. 🐟 But first, let's have a little bit of trivia... 😊

🤓 TRIVIA: Did you know that many fishes contain oils called omega–3 fatty acids that have health giving benefits? Two of these ω–3 fatty acids are DHA (docosahexaenoic acid) and EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid).

Structural formulæ of two ω–3 fatty acids

(Image taken from the Sigma–Aldrich website)

🤓 ...another TRIVIA: 👃 The "fishy" odour that we associate with fish is largely due to the formation of trimethylamine (TMA) from trimethylamine oxide (TMAO) that many fishes naturally contain. TMAO is broken down into smelly TMA by bacteria or fish enzymes. Lemon juice or vinegar—both acidic liquids—are frequently suggested for removing fishy smells when cleaning fish since they help convert stinky amines such as TMA into non-volatile, odourless, and water–soluble amine salts (McGee 2004, Stoker 2016). 🍋 🐟 Acidity also helps break down muddy–smelling geosmin that farmed freshwater fish (e.g. catfish, carp, tilapia) sometimes accumulate from blue–green algae (McGee 2004).

Conversion of trimethylamine oxide (TMAO) into trimethylamine (TMA) in fishes

Formation of an amine salt from trimethylamine (TMA)

Structural formula of geosmin

Nothing much to say tonight. I'll just have a quick dinner then off to bed soon as we start our second week of classes at 8:00 AM tomorrow. Bonne nuit! 🌛 😴