Cooking Seafood
When purchasing any kind of seafood or fish you really have to make
sure that what you are buying is fresh. Buying fresh seafood is as
important, if not more, then buying fresh chicken or meat. Bad or
spoiled seafood can cause serious health issues. It can not only making
you extremely ill but could also send you to the hospital if you aren’t
careful. With this in mind here are a few options for picking out the
freshest of the fresh. As you shop for fish, you should always look at
the eyes. If they are shiny, clear, and bright, then you have yourself a
pretty fresh fish. Their eyes will always turn to a dull grey color when
they are starting to age. You should also see a shine on the body as
well. If the body is starting to get discolored patches, you need to
walk away. Chances are good that it’s been sitting there for a while.
When buying seafood such as shrimp, you should always buy in bulk and
frozen with the shells on. The shells protect them from the freezing
process. You should also buy them with the heads on, if possible, as
they will be much moister when you cook them. This is also true for
crawfish. Shell fish are usually sold alive. If you place one on the
counter and tap the shell, it should close even tighter than it was
before. If it does this, you have a winner. Also, when you cook them
they should open up. If you have some that are not open after you have
cooked them, just throw them away. It’s really not worth the issues
involved to eat a bad shell fish. If you happen to live in an area
that has fish markets or stalls that is a very good way to make sure you
are getting fresh seafood. However, make sure that the market smells
good. If you smell something fishy in a fish market, chances are the
fish there are not very fresh.
When cooking seafood, you have to take into consideration what type
you are cooking. For the most part, when you cook seafood such as crab
legs, shrimp, or crawfish you just boil or steam them. It doesn’t take
very long for either of them if you have your water or steamer already
hot. Oysters, calamari, scallops, and other seafood like this can be
breaded and deep fried, or oven baked, as you wish. Calamari takes only
a couple minutes and will burn if not watched closely. Lobster is a good
one to either boil or bake and care must be taken not to over cook any
of it. Nothing turns one off more than over cooked, tough, and tasteless
seafood. If you are looking for seafood in your area, you might try
finding a farm. Seafood farms are found in a lot of places and make it
easier for more inland areas to be supplied with fresh seafood. This
takes the hassle out of trying to transport fresh seafood long distances
across country. Farm raised seafood can have a slightly different taste
than natural seafood as farm raised seafood is fed a certain type of
diet rather than what is available in the wide open ocean. It is also a
better way of reducing some of the mercury that is found in fish,
especially salmon, as they can have a better control program. Less
mercury means less of a chance for heavy metal poisoning, especially if
you eat a lot of seafood.
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