The first line of practice fish farming knows that it is not easy to practice!
"Splash fish" is not misleading, not exaggerated, not hyped!
Anchovies [shí] fish swim into rivers in early summer every year to spawn, like migratory birds punctual, so ancient called "time fish". And the place where we most commonly see anchovies must be the dining table.
Steamed anchovies. Image: huitu.com
Speaking of anchovies, it starts with a story:
The rich prince of Jiangnan was looking for a proud man outside, so he took him home and called him a bridesmaid, and the in-laws would believe it. When the girl first arrived at the in-laws' house, she was more than to be tested, so the mother-in-law threw a piece of anchovy to the girl to clean up, and the three sisters and six wives all flocked to the kitchen to pull the door slit to watch the liveliness, only to see the girl's hand up and down, sharply removing all the fish scales, everyone looked at the snickering and laughed, and the mother-in-law's face turned emerald. When the anchovy was on the table, everyone was stunned in an instant, and the steamed fish erupted into a small-scale golden light effect, only to see that all the scales of the anchovy were strung with silk threads and neatly stacked on the body of the fish. The mother-in-law immediately smiled and said: The girl is really from a big family with Zhong Mingding food.
Mother-in-law why said this, please see the following breakdown...
Its sex scales, delicate water Xi Shi
Anchovies (Tenualosa reevesii) herring family herring fish, like many herrings, the stick figure shape is particularly non-existent, the mouth of the anchovy is large and toothless, the body is covered with jagged round scales, the body side is flat and high, the scales are large and thin, the fat eyelid is very developed, the side and abdomen are silvery white, the head and back are slightly blue-green luster, and the body length is about 30 to 50 cm.
Anchovies (Tenualosa reevesii) Image: huitu.com
Anchovies are filter-feeding fish, mainly distributed in the South china sea and the East China Sea, prefer to inhabit the coastal middle and pelagic waters, feeding on plankton and organic detritus. In late spring and early summer every year, they migrate to the rivers to breed and form a fishing flood, and after spawning, the broodstock return to the sea, and the juveniles enter the tributaries or lakes to grow on bait, and anchovies were once very common fish species in the Yangtze River, Qiantang River, Pearl River and Minjiang River water system.
Painting: Chen Kanghou (1927)
"Yangzhou fresh bamboo shoots take advantage of the anchovy, rotten boiled spring wind in early March"
——Zheng Banqiao
Anchovies are impatient, eating and swimming very quickly, and often die from being hit by obstacles and descaling. The "Tune Ding Collection" has such a description: "Its sexual scales, one and the net value, do not move, protect its scales also." It is said that the anchovy is very delicate, and once the net touches its scales, it will not move, so the anchovy is also known as the "scale fish". The ancients liked to give the species a unique character, thinking that the anchovy is reluctant to live, elegant and high, so that the world rarely has a glimpse of its fresh beauty, in fact, and made into canned Herring Atlantic herring, but the oxygen tolerance is poor, out of the water is dead. < watch the Atlantic herring poke here >
Atlantic herring in the genus Herring in the family Herringidae. Image: Wiki commons
There is also a well-known story about anchovies. In the ninth time in "Journey to the West", the Dragon King of Jinghe transforms into a white-clothed Xiushi and goes to Chang'an City to find trouble for the warlock Yuan Shoucheng, because the latter can accurately calculate the location of the Jinghe water tribes. The Dragon King and Yuan Shoucheng bet on the time and point of tomorrow's rainfall, and Yuan Shoucheng would drive him out of the city if he miscalculated. As a result, the Heavenly Court suddenly descended on the Holy Will, requiring the Jinghe Dragon King to rain tomorrow at the time point that it was exactly the same as Yuan Shoucheng's calculations. Not willing to accept defeat, the Jinghe Dragon King privately changed the timing points of the rain, violated the Heavenly Rules, and the result was known to the Heavenly Court and beheaded at the Dragon Terrace. The one who gave the Jinghe Dragon King the idea was the Anchovy Army Division.
Yuan Shoucheng's clever calculation of selfless qu The old Dragon King clumsily calculated and violated the Heavenly Rules. Photo: Journey to the West / Chen Huiguan
The southern country is absolutely beautiful and has been praised by the ancients
What makes anchovies special is also the scales of the fish. The anchovies that swim into the river are fat and strong, and there is a wealth of fat under the scales, and after steaming, the oil seeps into the fish meat, which is extremely beautiful and stunning. Therefore, cooking anchovies does not scale, in order not to let its original taste lose, lock its fresh flavor, more exquisite will even take the gold wire string up the fish scales to facilitate the eating, such a high-pressure method must also be only available to large households, so there is a scene in the story at the beginning of the article.
Anchovies that do not need to be scaled when steaming. Image: huitu.com
"The scales are all liquid, and the chyles are always fat." Sweet and sweet who grams, years of storage acacia", the fish meat is tender and delicate, the scales are full of fat, such a delicious nature makes the ancients who lack oil and water incomparably fascinated, how can they not fire all the praise? "Bud ginger purple vinegar seared anchovy, this flavor is better than sea bass", here is compared to the previously introduced ancient people praised by the ancients in Jiangnan's first fresh --- "four gill perch". What is the perch praised by the < ancients? Poke here >
Four-cheeked perch. Image: chinese-sturgeon.com
Anchovies are equally famous as pufferfish and knife fish, known as the "Three Fresh Of the Yangtze River". Like most fish that spawn in the river, anchovies stop eating when migrating and swim to the Yangtze River area, which is the most fat, and if you swim further up, the fat is exhausted and the taste becomes worse. Therefore, anchovies are cherished by the Wu people, while the Jiangxi people do not eat them. Since the Ming Dynasty, anchovies have become tributes. "The bow of the ship is still under the net, the commander has prepared a stagecoach to send", after the anchovies were caught, they were immediately put into the ice cubes splashed with lard, and they were quickly sent to the imperial city day and night. Pleasing the saints has been the case in all dynasties and dynasties, so the precious anchovy is also known as the "fish of the breath".
The ancients' obsession with anchovies, in addition to being delicious, is more important than the mentality that ordinary people can't ask for it, and the powerful have to look for it to see their true bodies. But the anchovy that is loved by the ancients is very prickly, delicious and abrasive, Zhang Ailing once said that there are three hatreds in life: "one hates the anchovy with more thorns, the second hates the begonias without fragrance, and the three hate the dream of the Red Chamber is not finished." The things that fascinate people in the world are probably the same.
Distilled anchovies with lees. Image: huitu.com
Nowadays, the anchovies in the Yangtze River are difficult to find
The delicacy of anchovies may only stop at the speculation of the poetry of the ancients. In the 1970s, the annual production of anchovies in the Yangtze River was as high as 1,000 tons, and today, anchovies are only caught sporadically in the mouth of the Yangtze River every year. Large water conservancy facilities have cut off the main channels for anchovy cable bait migration and river spawning, coupled with overfishing and heavy water pollution, the natural resources of anchovies have been drastically reduced. The real Yangtze River anchovies are difficult to find, and most of the so-called anchovies on the market are Alosa alosa from the Americas and Stolothrissa macrura from Southeast Asia.
Flocks of herring in the river. Image: fineartamerica.com
Herring is commonly known as the American herring, and the herring and herring in the same family are very similar in appearance, and the introduction of cultured herring has been used as a substitute for anchovies for nearly a decade. The herring population is in good condition, and due to differences in dietary habits, native Americans do not like to eat this prickly fish, and the caught herring is sometimes even made into biofertilizer.
Fishing enthusiasts love the herring. Image: brittanyflyfishing.com
It's not just the table that the anchovy leaves, it's more desperate than its distant cousins. The natural environment has been functionally extinct, water pollution and overfishing have become two shackles on the anchovies, and the human masterpieces that cut off the clouds and rains of Wushan May also block their migration forever, and the anchovies that cannot return to their hometown are no longer the "time fish" that move on time.
(This article is from Species Calendar author @Salzburg Fish.)
If this article needs to be reprinted, please indicate the source, if there are different insights or content supplements, please leave a message or comment to share! For more information, please visit the aquatic professional website: Southwest Fishery Network!