DESPISED FISH HOUSEWIFELY CONTEMPT

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 23, 28 January 1915, Page 8

DESPISED FISH HOUSEWIFELY CONTEMPT

ECONOMY IN KITCHE* AND IN TRADE AN INTERESTING PROBLEM. Factors operatihg in the direction ot a higher coat of living are Jnaly and various. There are, possibly, conmodi* tie* which have been so afiected bj war conditions that operators have been, enabled te take advantage of the maiket. Again, there are departments of production in which the producing inadumry k not economically ' organised, ana in which the article could be cheapened \i the industry was placed on a businea basis; a*, for instance, fishing. Moreover, there is a lack of economical organisation in many households, with the result that dear food is made dearer by an absence of domestic economy. , Fißh can be used to illustrate the third case as well as the second. In a certain fish-retailing establishment in Wellington there were lately for sale flounders and soles at 6d a pound and gurnet at 2£d. A stream of buyers, of all ages and stages, called for the dearer fish, few for the gurnet. "Ib the gurnet euch a poor quality fish?" the retailer was asked. "It is not that," he replied, " but it is the fashion, to buy the better fish, and the women won't bother with the cleaning of fish like the gurnet. They would sooner buy a flounder or a sole, at two or three times the price— and that is one of the things that go towards the high cost of living," EQUAL IN NUTRITIVE VALUE. There is > no easily available means of comparing the nutritive quality of tho second -class New Zealand fishes, such as the gurnet, with "aristocratic" sort* like the flounder. But in other countries there is an equally marked distinction between first-class and second-class or "common" fishes; and in some of these the nutritive values have been compared. Jn New South Wales, for instance, substantially the same problem exists. Some time ago in that State the Royal Commission on Food Supplies reported : "The fish commonly regarded as 'inferior' or 'cheap' fish, such as mullet, black-fish, tailer^ salmon, herring, is, of equal if not superior nutritive value to the more expensive fish, such as whiting, snapper, etc., though most of the latter are more easily digetV cd." The cost of delivery and of the credit system are a constant tax on the meat, milk, and bread supplies. Proportionately, fish is not so burdened ; it is far more frequently paid for on the spot and carried home by the purchaser. It oftgbt therefore to be cheap; and, relatively, it is. But it would be far cheaper if the public taste ran more towards the nutritive "common" fishes. If a steady demand set in for them, the chances are that it would tend towards still greater cheapness, for the fisherman would pay more attention to this class of fish, would supply it with more regularity, might even at email additional cost undertake te clean it, thereby enabling it to be sold in sweeter condition, and thereby removing what some housewives consider an insuperable drawback. Much mutual advantage would result if the fishing industry and the household buyer both improved their methods, the latter giving more attention to the. "common" v&rieties, A little bit of cooking skill would go a long way towards making up the difference between the best and the seeond-besti Methods by which the fishing industry could be improved and placed on a business basis have already been outlined in The Post. WHAT THE LADY AT THE DOOR SAYS. Evidently the housewives of Wellington and of Sydney have much in common. This is how a fish shop man in Sydney, not long recruited from the sunny shores of the Mediterranean, sum* up the situation : — " The common fish, he is good, and he is cheap. But nobody want te cab him. The man who carry the fish basket around Mosman and Cremorne; he carry no mullet. He carry no blaekfish. He carry whiting, flounder, other high-priced fish. If he say, ' Here is good blackfish,' the lady of the house, she will say, 'Go away, Ido not want it ; where is the good flounder V The man who carry fish to Surry Hills, he tell you the same. All the lady at the door say that. Everywhere she say it. She will not have the common fish. It is the same here, at the Bhop. I have no mullet on my menu card. Nobody would eat it. Of course, I have tried. Of course, I could sell the mullet cheaper. But what is the good? The people will not buy it, except they come te the door, and take the fish away themselves. I sell some common fish that way. But I make not much money at that." The common fish is everybody's Cinderella. He it is that is thrown overboard first. Questioned the other day concerning the familiar statement that fishermen sometimes jettison fish in order not to spoil the price, a local retaile-r doubted whether this had ever been done in Wellington with regard to the finer fishes; but, as to the others, he was quite prepared to accept the allegation as true. Criticising the fishermen's casual way of handling the common fish, a Sydney agent thus deals with tKTe question of cleaning, referred to above : "Some of these common fish don't keep toOiWell. They would keep if they were cleaned when they were caught. But they are not cleaned. They're caught and packed and shipped and landed, and unpacked into baskets, and carted to the market, and unpacked on to tables, And handled by the buyer, and carried off by him, and then, finally, and at last— cleaned. No wonder a few of them taste a bit crook I Why don't the fishermen clean them? , Well, they just won't. I ,' Concerning the question of lack of organisation in the fishing and fishselling industry, how many of the following findings of the New South Wales Royal Commission on Food Supplies would be inapplicable to New Zealand ; fishing is distinguished by obsolete methods and happy-go«lucky laziness ; the deep-sea supplies are scarcely drawn on; "the quantity of fish caught for the Sydney market* week by week is largely dependent upon the voluntary activity of individuals who are, in many instances, without those incentives of economic necessity or commercial rivalry which operate to maintain tho supply of other commodities." DEEP SEA TRAWLERS AND ICE, Within the last few days it has been cabled that, in order to tackle tho business of trawling for deep-sea supplies, the New South Wales Government has purchased several up-to-date trawlers in England. The price paid is not stated> but the suggestion has been made that the war may have rendered North Sea trawlers cheap. In any case, the New South Wales Government's action looks business-like. One wonders whether it has been noted by the New Zealand Marine Department. Loss of the Kaikoura fish sent to Wellington raises in a concrete form tho ice question already dealt with by Mr. Ayson and Professor Prince. /The local retailer referred to above states that the North Sea trawlers pay for their ice 10s a ton delivered. Here, he says, tho prtee is £3 a ton, not delivered. That factor alone is a tremendous handicap i upon an. infant industry. *