I am paranoid that steaming is the most complete destination for a fish, and the original Cantonese steamed fish is the greatest respect for the fish. And the fish that most fits the soul of cantonese steaming, the grouper is one of them. When it comes to grouper, we are not unfamiliar with it, it is a general term for a class of fish, generally referring to all fish under the Epinephelidae family of groupers.
Steamed grouper.
Note: Groupers once belonged to the grouper suborder of the family Bassidae, and with the development of molecular techniques, there is growing evidence that the grouper subfamily has been elevated to the grouper family.
"Grouper" is a large family, and the world's grouper is divided into 16 genera and more than 160 species. The vast majority of groupers are tropical subtropical fish, preferring to inhabit the coastal islands and gravel, rock reefs, coral reefs on the seabed, There are about sixty species of coastal distribution in China, mainly in china's southeast coast and Xisha, Nansha sea. Among them, there are about ten species that are most often eaten and cultivated on a large scale, and friends in the south may be able to count them. In the Chaoshan language, grouper is called "[guò] fish".
The last word [guò] on the last line may not be visible on your phone, it looks like this.
How big can groupers grow
Most groupers are fat, with a large proportion of mouths and small ctenophoric scales, some species have scales hidden under the skin, the dorsal and pectoral fins are generally very developed, and the tail fin is fan-shaped or crescent-shaped. There are many kinds of groupers, and the body shape is similar, and the distinction depends on the difference in body color and markings, but the body color of groupers is variable, and the body color of the same species varies greatly depending on the breeding age and in different environments.
Adult brown spotted grouper.
Some groupers are more than a meter long and weigh more than 100 kilograms. For example, the brown spot grouper (E. fuscoguttatus), which is what we usually call "tiger spot", can reach a length of up to 1.2 meters, tiger spot meat is delicious, is a very valuable edible fish, but the size of the market is usually a few kilograms.
Thick soup tiger spots.
The reputation of "Dǔn" may be louder, but in fact, it is also a general term, and what they have in common is that they are large and the scales are covered by fish skin. For example, the black grouper (E. tukula), also known as money dragon, English name Potato cod. It has a tough appearance and can reach a length of up to 2 meters. People crossed tiger spot and dragon pod to breed dragon tiger grouper and pearl dragon pod.
Black spotted grouper.
The largest species in the tarpracuda ( E. arvense ) . lanceolatus) is also known as Flower Tail Dragon, Gentian Grouper, and English name Giant Grouper. It is very large, usually inhabiting caves and ravines in coral areas, and can feed on small sharks and turtles.
Adult saddle band grouper.
Saddle band grouper is a food fish with high economic value, once belonging to the high-grade fish species in Cantonese cuisine, and now it is widely farmed. Guangzhou once caught a giant saddle band grouper, with a body length of 2.65 meters and a weight of 680 pounds.
Giant saddle bander nearly 2.7 meters long.
Groupers are ferocious carnivorous fish, they like to wait for their prey to approach and then launch a surprise attack, when they prey, they will open their mouths, use the negative pressure of the sea water to generate suction, instantly swallow the whole instead of tearing up the prey, they will use the tooth plate in the throat to grind the prey. There have been records of giant groupers devouring divers and eventually spitting out divers because they can't crush oxygen cylinders, and you'll see how powerful they are if you look at the GIF below.
Giant groupers devour a shark more than a meter long
Groupers usually live alone, live in smaller areas, and generally do not migrate long distances except for a very few species. Grouper habitat water depth varies with water temperature, with shallower spring and summer and deeper autumn and winter. Grouper is a tropical and subtropical fish, the fat content is generally not high, but the meat is extremely delicate, known as the seabed chicken.
Grapefruit stuffy dragon belly.
Those grouper members who look good
Groupers living in coral reef waters are naturally variable in color, with dazzling stripes and beautiful spots. Groupers of the genus Parsinsons are also known as coral groupers, and some small groupers are not only delicious, but also often used as ornamental fish with their bright colors and elegant posture. For example, the leopard gill perch (Plectropomus leopardus), also known as the "Eastern Star Spot", is a medium and high-grade fish species that is extremely popular at Chinese banquets.
Leopard-striped gill perch is also known as the Eastern Star Spot.
The name of the East Star Spot comes from the beautiful black-edged blue spots all over the body, in addition to the bright red body color, the East Star Spot also has an olive-colored individual, but because Chinese prefer festive red, the price of the former is double the price of the latter. The flesh of the Eastern Star Spot is extremely tender and the taste is also high among groupers.
Thick soup east star spots.
Delicious and beautiful fish always can not escape the fate of overfishing, the Eastern Star Spot has been listed by the IUCN as a near-threatened level, the number of wild East Star Spots has decreased year by year, and the size of the captured East Star Spots has become smaller and smaller. However, the artificial breeding technology of East Star Spot has been relatively mature, which has alleviated the pressure on wild resources to a certain extent, and the price has become increasingly close to the people.
East Star Spot Brush Pot.
Cromileptes altivelis is probably the most valuable grouper species, the legendary "rat spot". Just reading the name seems to hear the sound of money, the mouse spots are very easy to identify, the whole body is white or translucent, covered with small black dots, the back is high and bulging, and the body color of the juvenile fish is even brighter.
Hunchback perch, also known as rat spots.
The flesh quality of rat spotted is one of the best in groupers, and the growth is relatively slow, and there is a habit of killing each other, and the survival rate of breeding has been very low, so the price is also high, and the probability of appearing on the market is not high.
Steamed rat spots.
The leader on the table
Groupers are so economically valuable, and their catches are rising year by year, with nearly a quarter of the world's more than 160 species of groupers threatened and in a near-or-critical state. Large species and large individuals are overfished, because groupers are mostly hermaphrodites, with sexual transformation characteristics, the first sexual maturity is all female, and then converted to male after a few years, and the sharp decline of mature large individuals is also extremely detrimental to population reproduction.
Diagonal bands of groupers are common on the dining table.
The world eats about 300,000 tons of groupers every year, nearly 90 million groupers, strong market demand and the pressure of wild populations make the artificial breeding industry also develop rapidly, and the currently widely farmed grouper species are oblique bander, spotted grouper, blue grouper, red spotted grouper, saddle band grouper and so on. At present, only groupers with oblique banders have reached large-scale full artificial breeding. Other species of fry still rely on wild fishing.
Tortoiseshell groupers commonly found on the dining table.
Most edible groupers are tropical reef fish, and wild groupers may be at risk of shegus due to food, but farmed groupers are much safer.
Having said all that, why didn't you say anything about the seabass grouper printed on today's calendar? Because it has no characteristics except for a loud Chinese translated as "giant grouper", it is extremely rare in the domestic market.
For groupers, find the editor