Fish heads, either separated or still attached to the rest of the fish, are sometimes used in culinary dishes, or boiled for fish stock.
Fish heads, either separated or still attached to the rest of the fish, are sometimes used in culinary dishes, or boiled for fish stock.
The head of a fish includes the snout, from the eye to the forward most point of the upper jaw, the operculum or gill cover (absent in sharks and jawless fish), and the cheek, which extends from eye to preopercle. The operculum and preopercle may or may not have spines. In sharks and some primitive bony fish, a spiracle, a small extra gill opening, is found behind each eye. [1]
The skull in fishes is formed from a series of only loosely connected bones. Jawless fish and sharks possess only a cartilaginous endocranium, with both the upper and lower jaws being separate elements. Bony fishes have an additional dermal bone, forming a more or less coherent skull roof in lungfish and holost fish. The lower jaw defines a chin. [1]
In some Jewish communities, it is traditional to eat a fish head for Rosh Hashana (literally "head of the year"). [2] [3]
In Chinese dining culture, the fish head is usually given to and eaten by the most senior person at the table.
In Sicilian witchcraft, it is customary to leave a fish head on the doorstep of one's enemy to ward off malicious intention. It is also performed by the eldest grandma when a mafia fishing family has been wronged by a business partner. The practice dates back to at least 1308, when Dante referenced it in his epic, the Divine Comedy .
In a more serious feud, escalation of hostilities can be signaled by the appearance of a goat head or horse head.
Fish heads are the subject of the 1978 novelty song "Fish Heads" by The rock duo Barnes & Barnes.
There are many references to talking fish heads in various dream sequences featuring Tony Soprano in the HBO series The Sopranos . [4]
Fish heads gained notoriety in 2009 with a Green Peace publicity stunt in which members of the activist group dumped five tons of fish heads on the door step of the French Fisheries Ministry. [5]
| Name | Image | Origin | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Caldillo de congrio |  | Chile | Made from congrio Colorado (red conger), an eel species common in the Chilean Sea, by boiling together fish heads, onion, garlic, coriander, carrots and pepper. Once these are boiled, only the stock is used. Onion and garlic are fried together with chopped tomatoes. The vegetables are mixed then with the stock, liquid cream, boiled potatoes and marinated and boiled conger. [6] |
| Chhencheda | India | Made with crushed fish heads along with vegetables. The main ingredients are fish (generally Rohu or Tilapia) head and vegetables like eggplant, potatoes, tomatoes, zucchini (called Janhi in Oriya), onions, etc. [7] | |
| Crappit heid | Scotland | (English: stuffed head). Can be traced to the fishing communities of the North, Hebrides and North-Eastern Scotland in the eighteenth century. In a time when money was scarce, the more expensive fillets of fish, such as cod or haddock would be sold to market but the offal and less attractive parts were retained by the fisherfolk for the pot. | |
| Stargazy pie |  | Cornwall | Made of baked pilchards, along with eggs and potatoes, covered with a pastry crust. Although there are a few variations with different fish being used, the unique feature of stargazy pie is fish heads (and sometimes tails) protruding through the crust, so that they appear to be gazing skyward. This allows the oils released during cooking to flow back into the pie. [8] [9] |
| Fish head casserole | China | Prepared with a fish head (about 1 kg), bean curd, cayenne pepper, sesame oil, vegetable oil, garlic sprouts, shallot, ginger, soy, salt, cooking wine, white sugar and monosodium glutamate. The fish head is washed, marinated in soy sauce, and fried with cooking wine added. The head is then stewed and served garnished with garlic sprouts and sesame oil. The broth in this dish has a milky white colour. [10] | |
| Fish head curry | Malaysia | This dish had its origins in Singapore, when a chef wanted his South Indian-style food to cater to a wider clientele, notably Chinese customers who considered fish head a specialty. The head of a red snapper is semi-stewed in a Kerala-style curry with assorted vegetables such as okra and eggplant (brinjals), usually served with rice or bread. | |
 | Indian | In India and Bengal where the staple is rice and fish, one very popular fish head curry is made with moog or ung beans but other vegetables can also be used. The gravy is very thick and very spicy. Rohu is most popular fish used for this dish. | |
 | Peranakan | Peranakans are a group of ethnic Chinese. Today Peranakan restaurants serve variations of this dish. | |
| Muri ghantoo | Bengali | Made from rice and fish heads, usually the heads of rohu. It is not fully cooked, giving the dish a grainy texture. Used on festive occasions. | |
| Tepa | Yup'ik | Tepas, also called stinkheads, are fermented whitefish heads. A customary way of preparing them is to place fish heads and guts in a wooden barrel, cover it with burlap, and bury it in the ground for about a week. For a short while in modern times, plastic bags and buckets replaced the barrel. However this increased the risk of botulism, and the Yupik Eskimos have reverted to fermenting fishheads directly in the ground. [11] [12] | |
| Fish Head Soup with Rice Noodles | Malaysia | A Malaysian breakfast made from simmering fish head and fish bones, usually with grasscarp. Traditionally, this fish stock was made by boiling and simmering deep-fried fish bones to achieve a milky white fish stock. [13] However, as times goes by, the local vendors adjusted the preparation method and used evaporated milk instead for convenience purposes to achieve the milky white fish stock. Hence, the locals has now grow accustomed to the milk-infused fish broth flavor. |
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Chowder is a thick soup prepared with milk or cream, a roux, and seafood or vegetables. Oyster crackers or saltines may accompany chowders as a side item, and cracker pieces may be dropped atop the dish. Clam chowder from New England is typically made with chopped clams and diced potatoes, in a mixed cream and milk base, often with a small amount of butter. Other common chowders include seafood chowder, which often consists of fish, clams, and other types of shellfish; lamb or veal chowder made with barley; corn chowder, which uses corn instead of clams; various fish chowders; and potato chowder, which is often made with cheese. Fish, corn, and clam chowders are popular in North America, especially Atlantic Canada and New England.
Gnathostomata are the jawed vertebrates. Gnathostome diversity comprises roughly 60,000 species, which accounts for 99% of all living vertebrates, including humans. Most gnathostomes have retained ancestral traits like true teeth, a stomach, and paired appendages. Other traits are elastin, a horizontal semicircular canal of the inner ear, myelin sheaths of neurons, and an adaptive immune system which has discrete lymphoid organs, and uses V(D)J recombination to create antigen recognition sites, rather than using genetic recombination in the variable lymphocyte receptor gene.
Acanthodii or acanthodians is an extinct class of gnathostomes. They are currently considered to represent a paraphyletic grade of various fish lineages basal to extant Chondrichthyes, which includes living sharks, rays, and chimaeras. Acanthodians possess a mosaic of features shared with both osteichthyans and chondrichthyans. In general body shape, they were similar to modern sharks, but their epidermis was covered with tiny rhomboid platelets like the scales of holosteians.
Ostracoderms are the armored jawless fish of the Paleozoic Era. The term does not often appear in classifications today because it is paraphyletic and thus does not correspond to one evolutionary lineage. However, the term is still used as an informal way of loosely grouping together the armored jawless fishes.
Jewish cuisine refers to the worldwide cooking traditions of the Jewish people. During its evolution over the course of many centuries, it has been shaped by Jewish dietary laws (kashrut), Jewish festivals and holidays, and traditions centred around Shabbat. Jewish cuisine is influenced by the economics, agriculture, and culinary traditions of the many countries where Jewish communities have settled and varies widely throughout the entire world.
Sinigang, sometimes anglicized as sour broth, is a Filipino soup or stew characterized by its sour and savory taste. It is most often associated with tamarind, although it can use other sour fruits and leaves as the souring agent such as unripe mangoes or rice vinegar. It is one of the more popular dishes in Filipino cuisine. This soup, like most Filipino dishes, is usually accompanied by rice.
Fresh fish rapidly deteriorates unless some way can be found to preserve it. Drying is a method of food preservation that works by removing water from the food, which inhibits the growth of microorganisms. Open air drying using sun and wind has been practiced since ancient times to preserve food. Water is usually removed by evaporation but, in the case of freeze-drying, food is first frozen and then the water is removed by sublimation. Bacteria, yeasts and molds need the water in the food to grow, and drying effectively prevents them from surviving in the food.
This glossary of ichthyology is a list of definitions of terms and concepts used in ichthyology, the study of fishes.
A fishcake is a culinary dish consisting of filleted fish or other seafood minced or ground, mixed with a starchy ingredient, and fried until golden.
Fish stew, when not a stew pond, is a stew with a soup base or ingredient of fish as food.
Cappon magro is an elaborate Genoese salad of seafood and vegetables over hardtack arranged into a decorative pyramid and dressed with a rich sauce.
Most bony fishes have two sets of jaws made mainly of bone. The primary oral jaws open and close the mouth, and a second set of pharyngeal jaws are positioned at the back of the throat. The oral jaws are used to capture and manipulate prey by biting and crushing. The pharyngeal jaws, so-called because they are positioned within the pharynx, are used to further process the food and move it from the mouth to the stomach.
The evolution of fish began about 530 million years ago during the Cambrian explosion. It was during this time that the early chordates developed the skull and the vertebral column, leading to the first craniates and vertebrates. The first fish lineages belong to the Agnatha, or jawless fish. Early examples include Haikouichthys. During the late Cambrian, eel-like jawless fish called the conodonts, and small mostly armoured fish known as ostracoderms, first appeared. Most jawless fish are now extinct; but the extant lampreys may approximate ancient pre-jawed fish. Lampreys belong to the Cyclostomata, which includes the extant hagfish, and this group may have split early on from other agnathans.
Seychellois cuisine is the cuisine of the Republic of Seychelles, an archipelago country consisting of 115 islands. Fish plays a prominent part in the country's cuisine because of its location in the Indian Ocean. Seychellois cuisine has been influenced by African, British, French, Spanish, Indian and Chinese cuisines.
A fish sandwich is, most generally, any kind of sandwich made with fish. The term is frequently used to describe food made with breaded, fried fish, which are commonly found in fast food venues.
Ikan goreng is a hot dish consisting of deep fried fish or other forms of seafood. Ikan goreng literally means "fried fish" in Indonesian and Malay languages.
