Ceviche

Lazarus Cooke wrote:

Hi RD

thanks for all this, and I agree with your need for precision. Since
the last post I've looked around, and discovered that that nasty
parasite is more common in Pacific salmon than in Atlantic, but is
pretty common in all wild salmon, (although not in farmed fish, for
obvious reasons if you can be bothered to go through the life cycle of
the parasite).

In fact, if you do a google on ceviche and salmon and uk , you will
come across lots of recipes for cevche of Atlantic salmon, including
some from big-name chefs, which make no mention of the parasite
problem (possibly they assume that all salmon is farmed, possibly
they're ignorant.)

Anyway, thanks for your input, which has helped me, and which I hope
may help some others.

Lazarus

FWIW, I've eaten raw Alaskan chinook and sockeye salmon many times with
no problems (admittedly more out of ignorance than bravery). Maybe
they're frozen before they're shipped to the market where I get them.

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

wrote:

Ahhhh...OK. First, I know Gordon Ramsay and agree that he is among the
biggies in the UK right now (but is doing a God-awful TV thing in the US
called "Hell's Kitchen"), and he is a talented chef, but what this
recipe makes is nothing like what many would recognized as "ceviche" and
while I won't speak absolutely for Chuck/Conan, I feel confident in
saying that he would agree. If this conversation had never taken place
and I were served this and asked what I thought it might be called on a
menu, I'd say some form of salmon carpaccio or similar. The word
"ceviche" would never enter into my mind.

Totally agreed on this. It does look more like a carpaccio
presentation than anything else. I know some ceviche recipes vary in
how long you "cook" the fish in the marinade, but this looks like a
"dressing" rather than a marinade.

I'd also feel that much of
the visible parasite danger would be minimized due to the construction
of the dish.

http://uktv.co.uk/food/recipe/aid/591238

This just sounds God-awful and is by no means "ceviche." Might I offer
"****ed-up Fishmess" as a more apt name. I have no idea who might
consider that **** "sophisticated," but drunken starving cats (as in
moggies) would seem a fair guess...and I suspect Ramsay would heave it
across the kitchen if it were brought to him...

Yeah, but first he'd holler, "*bleep* me senseless ... are you
trying to *bleep*ing kill me?!" :-)

and

http://www.spain4uk.co.uk/eats/marinated_salmon.htm

Now this one is interesting, mainly because of the website. I didn't
examine the site, but "ceviche" isn't a peninsular Spanish dish, it's
from the Americas, but escabeche, (Moorish) cured/pickled/marinated
fish, is Spanish, so I'm not sure of what they mean to convey with
"ceviche de salmon."

FWIW, my mom used to make escabeche, and IIRC, the word itself
describes the marinade, even though it's rarely said that way. So it
would be "pescado (or whatever) en escabeche". She made it with
firm-fleshed fish (plus carrots, onions and ?) and poached the fish first.

I'm wondering if someone didn't decide that the two words (ceviche
and escabeche) sound similar enough that they would try to link them
linguistically.


Chuck Vance

On Mon, 12 May 2008 07:46:03 -0500, Conan The Librarian
wrote:


http://www.spain4uk.co.uk/eats/marinated_salmon.htm

Now this one is interesting, mainly because of the website. I didn't
examine the site, but "ceviche" isn't a peninsular Spanish dish, it's
from the Americas, but escabeche, (Moorish) cured/pickled/marinated
fish, is Spanish, so I'm not sure of what they mean to convey with
"ceviche de salmon."

FWIW, my mom used to make escabeche, and IIRC, the word itself
describes the marinade, even though it's rarely said that way. So it
would be "pescado (or whatever) en escabeche". She made it with
firm-fleshed fish (plus carrots, onions and ?) and poached the fish first.

Yeah, IME, one can "escabeche" whatever - chicken, fish, etc., and
AFAIK, the escabeche'ing comes post-cooking (with heat). IMO, it's only
relationship to ceviche is the fact that it involves soaking the fish
and the terms sound similar, I guess - see below

I'm wondering if someone didn't decide that the two words (ceviche
and escabeche) sound similar enough that they would try to link them
linguistically.

I think that may be exactly what's happened - someone in the UK or on
the continent knew, generally, what escabeche was and heard, again
generally, about ceviche, and somehow, the two wound up combined/mixed.
Obviously, one can call a dish whatever they wish, but what the posted
recipes produce is nothing like what would be recognized as "ceviche" in
the Americas, nor is it what most Spaniards (or anyone else familiar
with "traditional" escabeche) I know would recognize as "escabeche."

TC,
R


Chuck Vance

In article ,
wrote:


I think that may be exactly what's happened - someone in the UK or on
the continent knew, generally, what escabeche was and heard, again
generally, about ceviche, and somehow, the two wound up combined/mixed.
Obviously, one can call a dish whatever they wish, but what the posted
recipes produce is nothing like what would be recognized as "ceviche" in
the Americas, nor is it what most Spaniards (or anyone else familiar
with "traditional" escabeche) I know would recognize as "escabeche."


The origin of 'escabeche' is easy enough, coming from the Hispanic
Arabic assukkabag, from Arabic sikbag (unfortunate transcription for
airplane travellers - looks better in arabic) and related to the
Persian sekba.

The arabic and persian both mean simply 'meat stew with vinegar', and
the thing about it is that it's cooked.

There's a translation of a 13th Century Andalusian (ie Arabic) recipe
for Sikbaj at

http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Mediev...an/andalusian4.
htm#Heading150

The etymology of 'ceviche' is controversial. Some people believe that
it derives originally from the Latin 'cibus' (food), some say it's
from the Quecha word for the dish 'siwichi', but many Peruvians
(including Gaston Acurio somewhere) believe that it is indeed derived
from 'escabeche de cebolla' (onion escabeche).

Lazarus

In article ,
wrote:


I Googled, and got different results. I first Googling "ceviche
'Atlantic salmon' uk" to try and get right to the, um, meat of the
matter, as it were.

Hi rd

No-one in europe would write 'atlantic salmon'. It's essentially the
only one there is. The rivers and seas and farms round the coast are
full of them. Here it's just called 'salmon'.

Pacific salmon crops up occasionally as a cheap, inferior (here),
frozen product.

Lazarus

In article valid,
Lazarus Cooke wrote:


No-one in europe would write 'atlantic salmon'.

Sorry. Repeating myself. Old age.

L

On Fri, 16 May 2008 10:05:47 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
wrote:

In article ,
wrote:


I Googled, and got different results. I first Googling "ceviche
'Atlantic salmon' uk" to try and get right to the, um, meat of the
matter, as it were.

Hi rd

No-one in europe would write 'atlantic salmon'. It's essentially the
only one there is. The rivers and seas and farms round the coast are
full of them. Here it's just called 'salmon'.

Pacific salmon crops up occasionally as a cheap, inferior (here),
frozen product.

Be careful with fish unless you know with whom you deal and/or you
yourself know how to identify what you are expecting. It's among the
most, um, "forged" stuff in the food service/supply industry because so
few people, including chefs, truly know the difference. Even most
consumers can tell veal from beef, real crab from "krab," or more
ridiculously, radicchio/rocket from iceberg, but fish, nope - they pay
for snapper and get tilapia, they think they're getting wild (Atlantic)
salmon and they're getting farmed Pacific, etc. I don't know that one
salmon (cheaper) is sub'ed for another (more expensive) in Europe _yet_,
(I would suspect it is) but trust me, the cheaper will be sub'ed for the
more expensive sooner rather than later anywhere it can be gotten away
with, by the supplier if not the kitchen/grocer (and oft-times, it's the
supplier, because that's where the real money is made on sub'ing).

TC,
R

Lazarus

On Fri, 16 May 2008 09:59:32 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
wrote:

In article ,
wrote:


I think that may be exactly what's happened - someone in the UK or on
the continent knew, generally, what escabeche was and heard, again
generally, about ceviche, and somehow, the two wound up combined/mixed.
Obviously, one can call a dish whatever they wish, but what the posted
recipes produce is nothing like what would be recognized as "ceviche" in
the Americas, nor is it what most Spaniards (or anyone else familiar
with "traditional" escabeche) I know would recognize as "escabeche."


The origin of 'escabeche' is easy enough, coming from the Hispanic
Arabic assukkabag, from Arabic sikbag (unfortunate transcription for
airplane travellers - looks better in arabic) and related to the
Persian sekba.

The arabic and persian both mean simply 'meat stew with vinegar', and
the thing about it is that it's cooked.

There's a translation of a 13th Century Andalusian (ie Arabic) recipe
for Sikbaj at

http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Mediev...an/andalusian4.
htm#Heading150

The etymology of 'ceviche' is controversial. Some people believe that
it derives originally from the Latin 'cibus' (food), some say it's
from the Quecha word for the dish 'siwichi', but many Peruvians
(including Gaston Acurio somewhere) believe that it is indeed derived
from 'escabeche de cebolla' (onion escabeche).

Interesting. I don't see how ceviche (sah/suh-vee-che/chee) could have
come from escabeche (s-kaa-beash) other than via written form (as
opposed to via common speech). That alone makes me have some question
as to the connection. I've heard it (ceviche) was a native Americas
dish and term, but not from linguistic experts - sometimes, however,
laypeople know a hell of a lot more than experts, and often, even if
they are a bit fuzzy on details, the kernel of the facts are correct.
I'd offer that the word "siwichi" makes more sense in practical terms,
but ???

TC,
R

Lazarus

In article ,
wrote:

On Fri, 16 May 2008 10:05:47 +0100, Lazarus Cooke
wrote:

In article ,
wrote:


I Googled, and got different results. I first Googling "ceviche
'Atlantic salmon' uk" to try and get right to the, um, meat of the
matter, as it were.

Hi rd

No-one in europe would write 'atlantic salmon'. It's essentially the
only one there is. The rivers and seas and farms round the coast are
full of them. Here it's just called 'salmon'.

Pacific salmon crops up occasionally as a cheap, inferior (here),
frozen product.

Be careful with fish unless you know with whom you deal and/or you
yourself know how to identify what you are expecting. It's among the
most, um, "forged" stuff in the food service/supply industry because so
few people, including chefs, truly know the difference. Even most
consumers can tell veal from beef, real crab from "krab," or more
ridiculously, radicchio/rocket from iceberg, but fish, nope - they pay
for snapper and get tilapia, they think they're getting wild (Atlantic)
salmon and they're getting farmed Pacific, etc. I don't know that one
salmon (cheaper) is sub'ed for another (more expensive) in Europe _yet_,
(I would suspect it is) but trust me, the cheaper will be sub'ed for the
more expensive sooner rather than later anywhere it can be gotten away
with, by the supplier if not the kitchen/grocer (and oft-times, it's the
supplier, because that's where the real money is made on sub'ing).

TC,
R

I totally agree. My girlfriend comes from a fishing town on the bay of
Naples, Italy, and one of my daughters lives in Barcelona, both of
which have superb, highly competetive fish-markets. London is a very
different thing. For some reason, even though the seas here are awash
with fish, the standard of fish-monging is poor, and the knowledge of
how to deal with fish equally so.

But salmon, which used to mean luxury, is now poor people's food, and
is generally the cheapest fish available - cheaper than much meat. It
is farmed in masses off the coasts, and is always salmo. (This is
unlike oysters, where the natives are available, but very expensive,
while pacific oysters are much more easily farmed and are therefore
much cheaper and widely available. )

Thus salmon is about half the price of, say, cod and haddock, the
normal ingredients of 'fish and chips' which was once the working-class
English dish but now probably costs about seven or eight dollars per
portion to take away.

therefore, while I agree that the vendors cheat if they have an
interest in doing so, in this case they don't.

As I say, Pacific salmon is an oddity. You get it occasionally, but as
it's neither cheaper nor better than local farmed salmo salmon, why
bother?

Incidentally, the BBC radio programme 'The Food Programme' last Sunday
was about your neck of the woods. You can hear it for the next day or
so at

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/foodprogramme.shtml

Lazarus

wrote:

Interesting. I don't see how ceviche (sah/suh-vee-che/chee) could have
come from escabeche (s-kaa-beash) other than via written form (as
opposed to via common speech).

I disagree there. Words change a lot in oral transmission.

That alone makes me have some question
as to the connection. I've heard it (ceviche) was a native Americas
dish and term, but not from linguistic experts - sometimes, however,
laypeople know a hell of a lot more than experts, and often, even if
they are a bit fuzzy on details, the kernel of the facts are correct.
I'd offer that the word "siwichi" makes more sense in practical terms,
but ???

As I remember it, Alan Davidson, editor of 'Petits Propos Culinaires',
argued the derivation from the Latin in his 'Oxford Companion to Food'.

The SF writer Paula Wolfert then took some exceptions to this and a
number of other points of Davidson's in an article in 'Food and
Foodways' some years ago (I don't have access to these at the moment -
they're not online and I'm at home and writing from memory and notes).

Wolfert wrote :

"This" (Davidson's etymology) "is incorrect. Ceviche or seviche is
nothing but a Mediterranean method of preserving raw fish. The Latin
American Spanish word seviche or ceviche comes from the Iberian Spanish
escabeche, also called schebbeci in Sicily, a word that means
³marinated fish.²"


The Peruvian derivation from escabeche de cebolla comes from a
discussion some years ago with Victor de la Serna, who edits the wine
column for El Mundo

http://elmundovino.elmundo.es/elmundovino/

-- de la Serna was only saying that the etymology was the subject of
much heated discussion in Peru, and that this was one possible
derivation.

I agree that the Quecha derivation ( which I think came from a fairly
unauthratative source)is appealing , but that doesn't mean it's true!
There's often a great sentimental nationalistic interest in claiming
native derivations.

Ah well. Time for lunch. It's Friday, and I was going to get some
sardines from the fishmonger in Brixton, but now you've put me off....

Good Appetite

Lazarus