Fish Heads Fish Heads Roly-Poly Fish Heads

A number of years ago I taught myself to fillet whole salmon from a book. Recently, I have found it very economical to buy whole salmon and fillet them at home. I vacuum pack the fillets with a little marinade and they are good for months. For some reason, I decided to get three salmons from my fish people at Mission Fresh Fish this time. It took me four hours to get these filleted and then to make salmon cakes out of the scarps, but it is well worth it. My wife gets a little grossed out by the operation and usually makes herself scarce. Having done this a number of times now, I appreciate handling the whole fish. It helps me appreciate the whole animal, so to speak, and encourages me to handle it with as much care and skill as a novice fish cutter can muster.

Mission Fresh Fish is a neat company. I used to buy from them years ago at the Mountain View Farmers' Marker. Pat, the head fisherman, is a real character. He looks the part of the sterotypical fisherman. In fact, he was featured in a print ad for Volkswagen as a prototypical fisherman. Unfortunately, when Pat is at the market, it is in Mountain View. But his staff in San Rafael do a great job, too.