Few people are not familiar with the technology of cutting and cleaning most types of marine or river fish. But how to clean the sterlet is not known to everyone, since it refers to sturgeon, different from other fishes structure of the body. And this implies that the methods of preparing it will also be slightly different. In fact, the sterlet is cut in the same way as the cleaning of its closest relatives, including sturgeon, bester, stellate sturgeon and beluga. What is the essence of this procedure and how do these fish differ from others?
Features of fish of the sturgeon family, influencing the way of their preparation
Unlike other fish species, sturgeon do not have scales on the whole body. But they have skin covered with a layer of mucus, as well as a few spiked keratinized formations, located along the body on the back and sides. People call them "bugs".Another feature of this type of fish is the lack of bones inside the body. Through their backbone, consisting of cartilages, a kind of vein is stretched, called a vizier, which must be removed when cutting.
Sterlet is a fish that is a delicacy. It is used for cooking the most delicious dishes. The extent to which such food will be useful and tasty depends on the observance of certain rules of cleaning and dressing technology. When buying sterlet is usually still alive, so it should be put in a freezer for a while. In this way it can be killed, and its entrails in the frozen state will be easier to gut. Before starting cleaning, fish should be taken from the freezer and put in water to partially defrosted.
In order for the sterlet to be used for preparing a dish, it is necessary to perform the following actions.
- With a sharp knife, cut off solid plates( "bugs") on the body of the fish along with a strip of skin.
- Putting it on your back, cut the abdomen from the base of the head to the tail.
- Take out all the insides and remove blood clots from the spine, rinsing the cavity in which it was all located, with water.
- Make two incisions in the spine near the head and tail and take out the vigil through the holes that are formed, gently pulling it at one end.
- After treating the fish carcass with boiling water, remove the skin from it.
- Remove the gills and rinse the cleaned sterlet in cold water.
Tip
Using a knife, cut it from yourself and so that the trajectory of the blade does not pass through the places where your hands are.
Some nuances of sturgeon cleaning
Although the above sequence of works does not seem complicated, yet before you clean the sturgeon or sterlet, you should consider a number of important points concerning the cutting of this species of fish.
- Depending on the dish that you are going to cook, the head is either separated or left.
- The skin is also not necessarily removed, as it lags behind the body during the heat treatment.
- If fish are going to fry, then it is desirable to remove the vertebral cartilage from it.
- When you take out the insides, make sure that the gallbladder does not burst, as the liquid leaking out of it, spilled on meat, can spoil its taste.
- Do not rush out everything that was separated during the cleaning of the fish, as some of this can be used to prepare other dishes.
And indeed, the last recommendation is completely justified. For example, inside the sterlet you have acquired, there may be caviar. You will, of course, extract it from there, but you will hardly want to throw it away. With it, you just need to remove the shell and saline, and after a while it can be used to make pates, casseroles or forshmaks. Similarly, milk can be used if they are found in some kind of fish.
Advice
Use the milk as soon as possible, because if they lie down in the open air for a while, they will get an unpleasant taste. This is due to the oxidation of fat, which is rich in this product.
If in the process of cutting a sterlet you have removed cartilages from it, they can also be used to prepare some dishes. But before that they are boiled until they become soft. In cases where there is a lot of fat inside, be sure to separate it and rinse it. This useful product is used as one of the ingredients for fish cutlets. Even trimmed strips of skins with "bugs" can be useful in culinary business. They cook a good broth, which is used to make jellied fish or soup.
Separately, it is worthwhile to talk about the benefits of the sight taken from the spine of the fish. This rope-like internal organ of sturgeon also found its place in culinary arts. But there is a natural question: why it should be necessary to pull out at fish cutting? The fact is that the visage is edible only the outer shell. And what it is filled inside, in general, can not be eaten, as this substance can be poisoned, so it is very dangerous to prepare a dish from sterlet or other fish of the sturgeon family without removing the vigil before it. But when the vizier is cleared of its internal contents and washed with water, then it is possible to make a stuffing for pies from it. Also, it is well stored in dried form, which allows it to be used much later, when you already forget, what taste was that sterlet from which you extracted it.
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