Josh Niland’s Eight Easy Tips for Storing Fish – and Why It’ll Result in Better Cooked Fish

If there’s one thing that Josh Niland dislikes, it’s ice. If you were to step into his seafood shop, Fish Butchery, or his pioneering restaurant, Saint Peter, the only ice you’re likely to see being used is in the drinks.

The fin-to-gill chef thinks ice and water used by fishmongers often results in a reduced shelf life, as well as bad-smelling fish, or what he calls that “fishy fish” smell. Even though it comes from the ocean, he argues that once a fish is out of water, its contact with the wet stuff should be minimised.

That’s a big part of the message in his latest award-winning cookbook, Fish Butchery: Mastering the Catch, Cut and the Craft, and his previous one, Take One Fish: The New School of Scale-to-Tail Cooking and Eating.

He reckons raw fish should be handled and dealt with like beef. A butcher would never cut off a sirloin, wash it under the tap, and then store it on a bed of ice – so why should mongers do that with fish? “One would assume the shelf life of the sirloin in question would drastically shorten and an odour would eventually develop, creating, perhaps, something referred to as a ‘beefy beef’,” writes Niland.

Here are his tips on fish storage and more.

1. Chuck the ice

When you buy your fish, request that it is not directly surrounded by ice. Ask for the ice to be supplied separately or, alternatively, bring along an ice pack in a cooler bag for transportation.

2. Wrap it in paper

Request that the fish be wrapped in paper, not plastic. Fish that is stored in plastic at variable temperatures will start perspiring, become damp and develop ammonia aromas (aka “fishy fish”).

3. Take it out of the packaging

Once home, remove the fish from its packaging. If your fish is already scaled and gutted and you are cooking it that day, transfer it to a clean wire rack set over a small tray or dinner plate and place it in the main chamber of your fridge, uncovered, until ready to use. A minimum of two hours in the fridge like this will result in skin that is dry enough to get crispy when pan-frying and give you confidence that it will not stick to your grill bars or pan (your fridge will only smell “fishy” if you are buying poor-quality fish).

If you are buying a fish for use in two to three days’ time, still place it on the wire rack but instead of putting it in the central part of the fridge, clear out the crisper at the base and store it there with the humidity vents left open. This will allow the fish to sit at a slightly lower temperature and not dry out too much, as we want to maintain day-one excellence but remove some of the fish’s unnecessary moisture. On the day you remove it from the crisper, ready to cook, put it in the main part of the fridge for one hour to dry the skin before cooking.

4. Leave the skin on

Regardless of whether you are pan-frying to make the skin crisp or poaching with the intent to discard the skin, leaving the skin on will benefit the fish’s overall flavour profile and nutritional value. The seam of fat that sits beneath the skin provides much of a fish’s wonderful flavour and is also a rich source of omega-3.

5. Do not wash a “fishy fish”

Washing a fish will not remove the smell of ammonia – if anything, it will make the fish more challenging to cook and add to the issue. The only way to partially eliminate or dilute volatile aromas such as ammonia is through the use of acidity. Lemon juice or tomato-based cookery methods, along with garlic and other alliums, all help mask odours (one reason they’re used so often in fish cookery), but the best approach is to shop wisely to avoid this situation in the first place.

6. Keep it on the bone

When working with a whole fish, keep it on the bone right up until you decide what to do with it. Leaving the fish on the bone reduces the potential for the flesh to be exposed to external moisture or bacteria growth.

7. Hang for longer-term storage

If you want to store fish beyond its first few days, use a static fridge with no fan. Here, fish can be stored on perforated trays but ideally they will be hung from the tail on hooks in whole form, post-scaling and gutting. To maintain these fish over time, wipe the skin and cavity of the fish with a paper towel to remove the perspiration that will naturally come to the surface.

8. Look after leftovers

For leftover cooked fish, ensure it is completely cold and then store in a clean, dry, covered container (ideally with a ventilated lid) in the fridge for up to two days, making sure that the temperature is well maintained. If reheating to serve, do so thoroughly.

This is an edited extract from Take One Fish by Josh Niland , published by Hardie Grant Books, $60, available in stores here. His latest book, * Fish Butchery: Mastering the Catch, Cut and Craft is also available, from $70.*