Herring as food

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Dutch herring stall Herring shack.jpg
Dutch herring stall
Fisherman selling smoked herring Fisherman Kalakauppias Kauppatorin rannassa IM8091 C.JPG
Fisherman selling smoked herring

Herring are forage fish in the wild, mostly belonging to the family Clupeidae. They are an important food for humans. Herring often move in large schools around fishing banks and near the coast. The most abundant and commercially important species belong to the genus Clupea , found particularly in shallow, temperate waters of the North Pacific and North Atlantic Oceans, including the Baltic Sea, as well as off the west coast of South America. Three species of Clupea are recognized; the main taxon, the Atlantic herring, accounts for over half the world's commercial capture of herrings.

Contents

Herrings played a pivotal role in the history of marine fisheries in Europe, [1] and early in the twentieth century, their study was fundamental to the evolution of fisheries science. [2] [3] These oily fish [4] also have a long history as an important food fish, and are often salted, smoked, or pickled.

Nutrition

Atlantic herring, raw
Herring.jpg
Nutritional value per 100 g (3.5 oz)
Energy 661 kJ (158 kcal)
0.0 g
Sugars 0.00
Dietary fiber 0.0 g
Fat
9.04 g
17.96 g
Vitamins and minerals
Vitamins Quantity
%DV
Thiamine (B1)
8%
0.092 mg
Riboflavin (B2)
18%
0.233 mg
Niacin (B3)
20%
3.217 mg
Pantothenic acid (B5)
13%
0.645 mg
Vitamin B6
18%
0.302 mg
Folate (B9)
3%
10 μg
Vitamin B12
570%
13.67 μg
Vitamin C
1%
0.7 mg
Vitamin D
21%
167 IU
Vitamin E
7%
1.07 mg
Minerals Quantity
%DV
Calcium
4%
57 mg
Iron
6%
1.10 mg
Magnesium
8%
32 mg
Manganese
2%
0.035 mg
Phosphorus
19%
236 mg
Potassium
11%
327 mg
Sodium
4%
90 mg
Zinc
9%
0.99 mg
Other constituentsQuantity
Water72 g

Percentages estimated using US recommendations for adults, [5] except for potassium, which is estimated based on expert recommendation from the National Academies. [6]

Raw Atlantic herring is 72% water, 18% protein, 9% fat, and contains no carbohydrates. In a 100 gram reference amount, raw herring provides 158 calories, and is a highly rich source (20% or more of the Daily Value, DV) of vitamin B12 (570% DV). It also has rich content of niacin, vitamin B6, vitamin D, and phosphorus (21-34% DV). Raw herring contains moderate amounts of other B vitamins and zinc, and is an excellent food source of omega-3 fatty acids. [7]

Contamination

Pacific and Atlantic herring are susceptible to contamination from environmental pollution, such as by PCBs, PBDEs, mercury, and listeria. [8] [9] [10] There is a (rare) risk of harmful bacteria from eating raw herring eggs. [11]

Preparation

Herring has been a staple food source since at least 3000 B.C. There are numerous ways the fish is served and many regional recipes: eaten raw, fermented, pickled, or cured by other techniques.

Raw

A typical Dutch delicacy is Hollandse Nieuwe (Dutch New), which is raw herring from the catches around the end of spring and the beginning of summer. This is typically eaten with raw onion. Hollandse nieuwe is only available in spring when the first seasonal catch of herring is brought in. This is celebrated in festivals such as the Vlaardingen Herring Festival and Vlaggetjesdag in Scheveningen. The new herring are frozen and enzyme-preserved for the remainder of the year. The herring is said to be eaten "raw" because it has not been cooked, although it has been subjected to a degree of curing. The first barrel of Hollandse Nieuwe is traditionally sold at auction for charity. Very young herring are called whitebait and are eaten whole as a delicacy.

Salted

In Norway, salting herring is a significant business. Herring was traditionally salted in wooden barrels and constituted a significant food resource. Salted herring is the basis for a number of herring dishes, as spekesild.

Fermented

In Sweden, Baltic herring ("Strömming") is fermented to make surströmming .

Pickled

Pickled herrings are part of German (Bismarckhering), Nordic, British, Canadian, Dutch, Polish, Baltic and Jewish [12] cuisine. Most herring cures use a two-step process. Initially, the herrings are cured with salt to extract water. The second stage involves removing the salt and adding flavorings, typically a vinegar, salt, and sugar solution to which ingredients like peppercorn, bay leaves and raw onions are added. Other flavors can be added, such as sherry, mustard and dill. The tradition is strong in Scandinavia, the Netherlands, Poland, Iceland and Germany.

Dried

In the Philippines, dried herring is popularly eaten during breakfast, along with garlic rice and eggs.

Smoked

A kipper is a split, gutted and cold-smoked herring, a bloater is a whole non-gutted cold smoked herring, and a buckling is a whole herring, gutted apart from roe or milt and then hot-smoked. All are staples of British cuisine. According to George Orwell in The Road to Wigan Pier , Emperor Charles V erected a statue to the inventor of bloaters.

Smoked herring is a traditional meal on Bornholm. This is also the case in Sweden, where one can get hard-fried/smoked strömming, known as sotare, in places like Skansen, Stockholm.

Other

In Scotland, herrings are traditionally filleted, coated in seasoned pin-head oatmeal, and fried in a pan with butter or oil. This dish is usually served with "crushed", buttered, and boiled potatoes.

In Sweden, herring soup is a traditional dish.

In Southeast Alaska, western hemlock boughs are cut and placed in the ocean before the herring arrive to spawn. The fertilized herring eggs stick to the boughs, and are easily collected. After being boiled briefly the eggs are removed from the bough. Herring eggs collected in this way are eaten plain or in herring egg salad. This method of collection is part of Tlingit tradition. [13]

Foods and dishes

NameImageOriginDescription
Avruga caviar Avruga caviar.jpg SpainAvruga is marketed by the Spanish company Pescaviar as a caviar substitute. It is made from herring (40%), salt, corn starch, lemon juice, citric acid, xanthan gum, sodium benzoate, squid ink and water. Unlike caviar, it does not contain fish roe. [14]
Bloater Van Gogh Bloaters-on-a-Piece-of-Yellow-Paper-1889.jpg England Popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries, bloaters are now rare. They can be contrasted with kippers. Kippers are salted and cold-smoked overnight while bloaters are salted less and not smoked for so long. Kippers are split and gutted before smoking while bloaters are smoked whole without gutting. Kippers are associated with Scotland while bloaters are associated with England. Bloaters have their own characteristic slightly gamey flavor and are called "bloaters" because they swell or bloat during preparation. [15] [16] [17] [18] [19]
Brathering GT Brathering 1.jpg Germany A dish of fried marinated herring. A common recipe starts with fresh herrings with the head and gut removed that are breaded or turned in flour, fried and then pickled in a marinade of vinegar. The pickled herrings are then boiled briefly in water containing onion, salt, spices like pepper, bay leaves, mustard seeds, and a little sugar. The herring are served cold with bread and fried or jacket potatoes. [20]
Buckling Buckling.jpg EuropeanA hot-smoked herring similar to a kipper or bloater. The guts are removed but the roe or milt remain. Buckling is hot-smoked whole, as opposed to kippers which are split and gutted, and then cold smoked. Bucklings can be eaten hot or cold. [21] [22]
Dressed herring Selidi pod shuboi.jpg Russia A layered salad of diced salted herring covered with alternating layers of grated boiled vegetables (potato, carrot and beet root) and chopped onions. Optionally includes a layer of fresh grated apple. The final layer is beet root covered with mayonnaise, which gives the salad a rich purple color. Often decorated with grated boiled eggs. Popular in Russia and other countries of the former USSR, where it is traditional at New Year and Christmas celebrations. Also known as herring under a fur coat or just fur coat. [23] [24] [25] [26]
Fischbrötchen
(lit. fish sandwich)
Fischbroetchen 01 (fcm).jpg Germany A sandwich or roll made with fish and onions, sometimes also made with remoulade and pickles. Most commonly made with bismarck herring or soused herring, and eaten in Northern Germany, due to the region's proximity to the North Sea and Baltic Sea.
Gibbing Netherlands
Gwamegi Korean cuisine-Gwamegi-01.jpg Korea
Herring noodle Esashi Nishin Soba.JPG Japan Called Nishin-soba (にしん蕎麦)
Herring roe Herring roe.jpg Japan Called Kazunoko (数の子). Usually, it is served as a part of Osechi in the Japanese new year.
Herring soup Sweden
Herring spawn Herring spawn.jpg Japan Called Komochi-Kombu (子持昆布). Usually, it is served as a part of sushi or chinmi.
Herring spawn Matsumaezuke.jpg Japan Called matsumae-duke(松前漬け)
Herring with mushrooms Lithuania Traditional Christmas Eve dish. Lithuanians have more than 100 different variations on how to prepare herring.
Kibinago Kibinago sashimi by jetalone in Kagoshima.jpg Japan
Kipper Kipper.JPG United KingdomA whole herring that has been split from tail to head, gutted, salted or pickled, and cold-smoked.
Pickled herring Midsummer pickled herring.jpg Northern Europe
Rollmops Rollmops 01 retouched.jpg Germany
Schmaltz herring Ashkenazi Jews (Eastern Europe)
Śledzie Zywnosc - 030.JPG Poland Pickled herring with chopped onions, eggs peeled and chopped (hard-cooked), apple - lemon juice, sour cream, garlic, salt and pepper, added to herring and mixed well, Sprinkled with dill or parsley. Served with rye bread. It is also traditionally one of the twelve dishes served at Christmas Eve (Wigilia).
Solomon Gundy Solomon Gundy.jpg Jamaica
Soused herring Haring met ui.jpg Netherlands
Spekesild Spekesild.jpg Norway A traditional Norwegian dish with salted and filleted herring, often along with boiled potatoes, raw onions, pickled beets, butter and flatbrød. Spekesild is also the basis for several variants that are placed on top of bread slices in boneless slices, such as pickled herring (sursild), spicy herring (kryddersild), mustard herring (sennepsild) and tomato herring (tomatsild).
Surströmming Surstromming.jpg Sweden
Vorschmack Forshmak po-odesski.jpg Ashkenazi Jews (Eastern Europe)Chopped herring salad

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kipper</span> Whole cold-smoked herring

A kipper is a whole herring, a small, oily fish, that has been split in a butterfly fashion from tail to head along the dorsal ridge, gutted, salted or pickled, and cold-smoked over smouldering wood chips.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Herring</span> Forage fish, mostly belonging to the family Clupeidae

Herring are forage fish, mostly belonging to the family of Clupeidae.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roe</span> Egg masses of fish and seafood

Roe, or hard roe, is the fully ripe internal egg masses in the ovaries, or the released external egg masses, of fish and certain marine animals such as shrimp, scallop, sea urchins and squid. As a seafood, roe is used both as a cooked ingredient in many dishes, and as a raw ingredient for delicacies such as caviar.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pickled herring</span> Traditional way of preserving herring

Pickled herring is a traditional way of preserving herring as food by pickling or curing.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Soused herring</span> Dish of raw herring pickled in vinegar

Soused herring is raw herring soaked in a mild preserving liquid. It can be raw herring in a mild vinegar pickle or Dutch brined herring. As well as vinegar, the marinade might contain cider, wine or tea, sugar, herbs, spices, and chopped onion.

<i>Smørrebrød</i> Open-faced sandwich found in Danish and Norwegian cuisine

Smørrebrød, smørbrød "butter bread" (Norwegian), or smörgås "butter goose" (Swedish), is a traditional open-faced sandwich in the cuisines of Denmark, Norway and Sweden that usually consists of a piece of buttered rye bread, topped with commercial or homemade cold cuts, pieces of meat or fish, cheese or spreads, and garnishes.

Norwegian cuisine in its traditional form is based largely on the raw materials readily available in Norway and its mountains, wilderness, and coast. It differs in many respects from continental cuisine through the stronger focus on game and fish. Many of the traditional dishes are the result of using conserved materials, necessary because of the long winters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Smoked fish</span> Fish that has been cured by smoking

Smoked fish is fish that has been cured by smoking. Foods have been smoked by humans throughout history. Originally this was done as a preservative. In more recent times fish is readily preserved by refrigeration and freezing and the smoking of fish is generally done for the unique taste and flavour imparted by the smoking process.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dried fish</span> Fish preserved by drying

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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cured fish</span> Fish subjected to fermentation, pickling or smoking

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An acquired taste is an appreciation for something unlikely to be enjoyed by a person who has not had substantial exposure to it. It is the opposite of innate taste, which is the appreciation for things that are enjoyable by most people without prior exposure to them.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tlingit cuisine</span> Culinary traditions of the Tlingit people

The food of the Tlingit people, an indigenous group of people from Alaska, British Columbia, and the Yukon, is a central part of Tlingit culture, and the land is an abundant provider. A saying amongst the Tlingit is that "When the tide goes out the table is set."This refers to the richness of intertidal life found on the beaches of Southeast Alaska, most of which can be harvested for food. Another saying is that "in Lingít Aaní you have to be an idiot to starve". Since food is so easy to gather from the beaches, a person who cannot feed himself at least enough to stay alive is considered a fool, perhaps mentally incompetent or suffering from very bad luck. Though eating off the beach could provide a fairly healthy and varied diet, eating nothing but "beach food" is considered contemptible among the Tlingit, and a sign of poverty. Shamans and their families were required to abstain from all food gathered from the beach, and men might avoid eating beach food before battles or strenuous activities in the belief that it would weaken them spiritually and perhaps physically as well. Thus for both spiritual reasons as well as to add some variety to the diet, the Tlingit harvest many other resources for food besides what they easily find outside their front doors. No other food resource receives as much emphasis as salmon; however, seal and game are both close seconds.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bokkoms</span> Whole, salted and dried mullet

Bokkoms is whole, salted and dried mullet, and is a well-known delicacy from the West Coast region of South Africa. This salted fish is dried in the sun and wind and is eaten after peeling off the skin. In some cases it is also smoked. It is sometimes referred to as "fish biltong".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bloater (herring)</span> Term for herring that is smoked whole

Bloaters are a type of whole cold-smoked herring. Bloaters are "salted and lightly smoked without gutting, giving a characteristic slightly gamey flavour" and are particularly associated with Great Yarmouth, England. Popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries, the food is now described as rare. Bloaters are sometimes called a Yarmouth bloater, although production of the product in Yarmouth appears to have now ceased in the town with the closure of its smoked fish factory in 2018. The bloater is also sometimes jokingly referred to as a Yarmouth capon, two-eyed steak, or Billingsgate pheasant.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Century egg</span> Chinese egg-based culinary dish

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<i>Clupea</i> Genus of fishes

Clupea is genus of planktivorous bony fish belonging to the family Clupeidae, commonly known as herrings. They are found in the shallow, temperate waters of the North Pacific and the North Atlantic oceans, including the Baltic Sea. Two main species of Clupea are currently recognized: the Atlantic herring and the Pacific herring, which have each been divided into subspecies. Herrings are forage fish moving in vast schools, coming in spring to the shores of Europe and America, where they form important commercial fisheries.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cod as food</span> Gadidae fishes in human nutrition and cooking

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yupʼik cuisine</span> Culinary traditions of Yupik people

Yup'ik cuisine refers to the Inuit and Yup'ik style traditional subsistence food and cuisine of the Yup'ik people from the western and southwestern Alaska. Also known as Cup'ik cuisine for the Chevak Cup'ik dialect speaking Eskimos of Chevak and Cup'ig cuisine for the Nunivak Cup'ig dialect speaking Eskimos of Nunivak Island. This cuisine is traditionally based on meat from fish, birds, sea and land mammals, and normally contains high levels of protein. Subsistence foods are generally considered by many to be nutritionally superior superfoods. Yup’ik diet is different from Alaskan Inupiat, Canadian Inuit, and Greenlandic diets. Fish as food are primary food for Yup'ik Eskimos. Both food and fish called neqa in Yup'ik. Food preparation techniques are fermentation and cooking, also uncooked raw. Cooking methods are baking, roasting, barbecuing, frying, smoking, boiling, and steaming. Food preservation methods are mostly drying and less often frozen. Dried fish is usually eaten with seal oil. The ulu or fan-shaped knife is used for cutting up fish, meat, food, and such.

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Other References