{"id":5583,"date":"2015-10-06T19:09:09","date_gmt":"2015-10-06T19:09:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/?p=5583"},"modified":"2015-10-06T19:09:09","modified_gmt":"2015-10-06T19:09:09","slug":"pike-with-speck-onion-fennel-potato-yellow-beans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/?p=5583","title":{"rendered":"pike with Speck, onion, fennel; potato; yellow beans"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"pike_on_ice\"<\/a><\/p>\n

it’s called a ‘walleye’ (they also\u00a0sell it\u00a0whole, here\u00a0Spanish mackerel below, bluefish above);<\/p>\n

\"pike_fillet_seasoned\"<\/a><\/p>\n

on our kitchen counter, seasoned, ready to be floured;<\/p>\n

\"pike_potato_yellow_beans\"<\/a><\/p>\n

and on the plate.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It’s a wonderful fish.<\/p>\n

While growing up in Michigan and Wisconsin, I thought of the walleye<\/a>, or ‘walleyed-pike’,\u00a0or\u00a0just ‘pickerel, as a very big thing, virtually the subject\u00a0of fable, and not just because Algonac, where our turn-of-the-20th-century porched cottage\u00a0sat on the St. Claire River, is the home of the nonpareil\u00a0Algonac Pickerel Tournament<\/a>\u00a0 [slideshow of 1949 parade here<\/a>]. \u00a0To tell the truth, I was actually always much more excited by the scary\u00a0Muskellunge<\/a>, or ‘Muskie’. \u00a0It was a catch which might have been more elusive, but\u00a0their angry bared-teeth heads were everywhere, mount-it-yourself trophies hung\u00a0above the garage doors (or in dens<\/a>) of successful\u00a0pursuers, much like the antlers which land hunters, who also sought out size<\/em> (numbers of ‘points’ on ‘racks’), still display to\u00a0invite the\u00a0admiration\u00a0of their peers.<\/p>\n

But me, I stuck with perch and sunfish.<\/p>\n

That’s the background for my\u00a0excitement\u00a0five years\u00a0ago<\/a>\u00a0when I found, while visiting The Lobster Place, a small sign for and display of beautiful white fillets of ‘pike’, specifically, ‘wild West Virginia pike’.<\/p>\n

Looking on line, I’ve just learned that the Chain Pickerel [Esox Niger<\/em>]<\/a>,\u00a0so named because of its scale\u00a0figuration,\u00a0is an eastern variant of the pickerel, found in all kinds of \u00a0waters, in\u00a0West Virginia probably most notably\u00a0in\u00a0the main channel of the Ohio River. \u00a0It\u00a0seems that it was\u00a0this pike that I first took home from The Lobster Place.<\/p>\n

Lately the Chelsea Market shop has been showing pike labelled, ‘wild: Great Lakes’. \u00a0The fish guy told me he thought it came from Wisconsin waters, but he wasn’t certain. \u00a0For sure I can go with Wisconsin; it’s where my parents’ families have lived for nearly 200 years, and Grandfather Wagner’s farm there bordered Lake Michigan; it’s also where I spent parts of many summer vacations (when we were not in Algonac),<\/p>\n

The American pike is very close to the European ‘zander<\/a>‘, or ‘pike-perch’, which we’ve\u00a0enjoyed as very special treats in Germany.<\/p>\n

Last night we enjoyed it at home in Chelsea.<\/p>\n