On 19/04/07, jim.dodgen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > this sort of messes up my "White swan and fresh fish" feast I was > planning :) > > Most of the stuff you'd catch on the canal is uneatable anyway unless you soak if for days in salted water to get rid of the muddy taste. The exception is zander, that beady-eyed predator from east Europe that has become such a pest you are actually prevented by law from throwing it back. This is rather convenient. It will require the statutory salt bath, but after that... delicious. Same with your American crayfish. Dumb as your politicians but far tastier. Chuck a bit of raw chicken on a line in some places on the cut and within minutes you'll have 'em up hanging on to it with their claws as if their life depended on it, which of course it does, though not in the way they think. Leave them in fresh lightly salted water for a day or two. Poach them lightly. Eat their tails with garlic mayonnaise.
Swans on the other hand are royal game or summut like that. I think you get your head chopped off if you kill one. That's if they don't kill you first, ill tempered creatures that they are. Moorhens are a better bet, though really too cute to kill (besides they can screech like a siren if you manage to catch one) Mallards too, despite their prevalence, are perceived as being more decorative than delicious in these islands, and necking them on the towpath tends to upset young children and the elderly. Go for geese instead: the big white ones are the juiciest but they tend to be owned by someone, even if it is a farmer five miles away who hasn't seen his flock since they absconded a couple of years before. So go for the Canada variety. These are so common you will almost invariably find yourself sharing your bed with them at some stage if you ever make a trip over here; though in inimitable British fashion we have them protected or listed or summut like that. One way or another, you aren't supposed to touch them though no-one will care a toss if you do, so generally disliked are they for their habit of converting a good grassy meadow to a sh*t pit in under 24 hours. Starter: Crayfish in farm egg, free range mayonnaise with wild garlic Main: Grilled duck breast on a lightly poached bed of young nettles; or Zander poached in a bouillon of wild herbs with potatoes vole. Sweet: (only available in autumn on the Oxford) Warm blackberry and Crab Apple crumble with Jersey ice cream (from the boat near Pigeon's Lock at Kirklington where you can see the cow it's come from) Steve [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
