Dear reader,
One of my biggest food icks is fish.
If I’m eating sushi, it’s strictly shrimp or crab. If salmon is somehow involved, I drown it in soy sauce just to mask the flavor. Which is why it makes zero sense that this weekend, I caught fish myself to eat.
Now, before you imagine me on a fishing boat at 5 a.m. in the open sea with fishing gear, let me set the scene. I was at a fish farm in Oyoun Orghosh. It’s a really long drive to get up there, between Bekaa and Bsharri, but it’s worth it. The whole place is famous for these little spring ponds packed with fish. Fun fact: during winter, the water freezes over completely, and the fish literally start eating each other to survive, but that’s a darker story.
To get to Oyoun Orghosh from the Bekaa, you drive through Yammouneh, passing right by the cannabis farms.
We found this cute small restaurant run by a couple in their 80s. There were no other customers, so it was my cue to step up. I grabbed a net, leaned over the pond, and spent what felt like hours trying to catch a reasonably-sized fish. I finally caught it, and my friend took a dad picture of me proudly holding it up. It was still alive and slipping out of my hands like butter. My friend finally got the job done by sticking the knife right through the fish’s head.
I have never seen a fish bleed like that in my life. But apparently, according to experts, the more stress a fish goes through while being killed, the worse the meat tastes, so spike killing it through the brain is the standard.
After a rather traumatizing “catch,” I couldn’t say no to food, even if it was fish. It didn’t taste so bad, even if it was steeply priced for a trout.
I’m still sticking to my cocktail pané at Salim Sur Mer next weekend, but for one day I somehow survived eating fresh fish.
If you’re also not a fan of fish but hate when someone pronounces the L in salmon, I recommend you try making Alan Geam’s shrimp fatteh, Liza Asseily’s Lebanese-style guacamole shrimp, and Jaimee Lee Haddad’s Capellini pasta with shrimp.
Melissa Manouchakian
Distribution editor
Our recipies:
- Liza Asseily’s Lebanese-style guacamole shrimp
- Capellini pasta with shrimp: Fast and fabulous
- Alan Geaam's shrimp fatteh
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