Fish
with
Nathan Outlaw
Part 1/2
Nathans background in fish, seasonality, quotas and the price of fish
I sit down to talk all things fishy with a man who carries the crown, two Michelin star and fish lover Nathan Outlaw.
Remember your dad on a Sunday morning eating an old kipper? It would bloody stink the whole house out. I'm here to discuss the fish-eating habits of Britain and how the fishing industry is much more, beyond that piece of fish on the plate.
I’ve driven overnight from London, slept in what I thought was a quiet spot, but turns out while the condensation drips down over my shitty self-made bed, I am in a driveway, and they want me and my car out the way. Bleary-eyed and slapped around the face by the oddity of fresh air, after a 6-hour drive in the rain, its blue, blue everywhere.
I like fish; I didn’t when I was little, I still remember moving tables away from my father in hillside Spanish restaurants when he ordered the local fish dish. (I called my father and asked what that fish was, he said he thinks it was a fish stew with god knows what. He liked it.) I cook with all kinds now, one of those new millennials that want to know and do everything I suppose. My assumptions here, many people still think fish is smelly, no idea how to cook it and anything in a tin, is well, probably from the war.
My wife and her family introduced fish to me more recently as keen goers of the sea. Whether locally caught crab or lobster (which isn't half cheaper outside the city), drinking and dancing on table tops later, or a whole flat fish shared over the counter, something about being at sea just helps the cause of eating and enjoying it.
Part 1
Beneath Cornish waters
Nathans background in fish, seasonality, quotas and the price of fish
“We are an island surrounded by what I believe is the best seafood in the world”
From a restaurant point of view, Nathan explains, that they get a lot of people through the doors who are experiencing fish for the first time (Christ, what did they ever eat next?) mainly because of recommendations or reviews. They have the theory, by trying the UK's number 1 restaurant (Good Food Guide 2018) they are either going to like fish, or are never going to like fish. It's a fish restaurant only, so losing customers when partners refuse to eat fish is common, but it's practice served since birth. Nathan says "I set this up to serve the best possible seafood I can get my hands on".
Ironically Nathan's mother doesn't eat fish. Reason? School dinners, bad experiences when she was a kid, the smell, the BONES, eyes and faces, fins, everything. Nathan believes "it's a cultural thing, we in Britain have not embraced fish, madly we are an island surrounded by what I believe is the best seafood in the world". Travelling the world, yes Japan is very high up there but "the difference is they know how to look after the fish, the fishermen have massive respect, and the market and the customers. Where here it is a commodity, people/fishermen would have evolved to catch as much fish as they can, bring it to shore, stick it on the market, go to the pub, and wait until it’s sold and then go back and collect their money”. Now that is something they cannot afford to do, with smaller quotas, targeting specific species, not as many fish and they have to be businessmen and in particular more ethical.