Food File - Book review
Mark Hix's Fish etc, published by Quadrille, £18.99 hardback.
Despite the stark warnings about the state of the fishing industry in this country, fish and seafood have never been a more popular choice in pubs and restaurants.
"Overfishing", "illegal landings", "fish stocks" and "depleted fleets" are just a few of the phrases that regularly crop up in newspapers reporting on the worsening situation. But still we order fish and seafood whenever it appears on the menu. And who can blame us? Healthier than red meat, lighter andversatile to cook, a piece of fresh fish or seafood can be a thing of sheer joy. There may be a shortage of fish in the sea, but there has certainly never been a dearth of books on the subject.
From the Jane Grigson and Alan Davidson classics of the '70s, to the TV-related Rick Stein and Keith Floyd books of the '80s and through to rising stars such as Mitchell Tonks (whose Fresh earlier this year must rank as one of the best books on fish for years), the shelves of bookshops must be groaning under the weight of them. And now we have Fish etc by Mark Hix. It's Hix's third book (although he co-wrote two others with restaurant critic AA Gill) and it's the follow-up to the excellent British: Simple Ways To Success.
Along with Rowley Leigh and Henry Harris, Hix is one of the new generation of working British chefs who write as well as they cook. As well as penning a weekly column in The Independent on Saturday magazine, he is chef director of the company that owns three of London's top restaurants: Le Caprice, The Ivy and J Sheekey. Since his seaside childhood in Dorset, Hix has been passionate about the fruits of the sea and this book reflects that love affair with fish and seafood.
Taking into account that many of the home cooks who the book is aimed at find fish difficult to cook, the first part of the book gives useful instructions about buying, storing, gutting, filleting and preserving fish. The book, which is lavishly illustrated with Jason Lowe's understated but brilliant photographs, is divided into six chapters: fast fish, soups, light fish, comfort fish, super-healthy fish and posh fish. There are more than 150 recipes in Fish etc, from simple no-cook dishes like fish ceviche and salmon tartare, through to more involved dinner party dishes such as fillet of sea bass with lobster mash and steamed razor clams with chorizo and broad beans.
Between these two extremes, the chapter on comfort dishes features several excellent gastro pub-friendly dishes such as kedgeree, smoked haddock with poached egg and colcannon, and a great fish pie. There are a lot of very good fish cookbooks about at the moment, and this is one well worth reeling in.
