Friday, July 27, 2012

Something tastes fishy......


For my Experiment I tried three different types of fish to see which one I liked best, based on taste and texture. My hypothesis would be that I would like the bass, since I enjoyed it in class. I also thought I would like the salmon because I have eaten salmon before and have enjoyed it. For the blue fish I was skeptical, since I’ve never tried it, but thought I might enjoy it too.

First, I went to Whole Foods, to the fresh fish station. I looked at the types of fish, and choose to buy an Alaskan Salmon Coho filet and a Blue Fish Filet. I showed the man behind the counter the size of my bass, and asked him to give me cuts closest to the size of my bass. I realize now I should have probably have him weigh my filet of bass and have each piece the same weight. He informed me that the blue fish was caught locally, as was our bass.

When I got home I put ¼ of a cup of Whole Foods Mediterranean Herb Marinade on each piece of filet and spread it on them as evenly as possible. After an hour of letting the marinade sit on the fish I put in the fridge, I placed each piece on a pan, covered the whole pan in foil and set the oven to 350 degrees and the timer for 30 minutes. I paled the pan on the middle rack in the center. After 15 minutes, I checked if all of the filets were cooked thoroughly, by cutting open, to the bottom of the pan, and looking at color of the fish. They all were cooked perfectly, by my taste.

Then came the tasting…I laid each out on a plate in the same position I had had them in to start and did three rounds of tasting. The first two from left to right, and the last, after a half hour going by, from right to left. After each bite I cleansed my palate with drinking water with lemon.

Round 1:
1.     Bass-not very fishy tasting and enjoyed the texture. No lingering flavor on the Pallet.
2.     Salmon-broke into smaller pieces upon the first couple of bites, compared to the Bass and has more flavor, lingering on the pallet after tasting. Not too fishy tasting either
3.     Blue Fish-Yuck! Thickest texture and tasted fishy with a slight bitterness lingering on the pallet.
Round 2:
            Liked the texture of the bass the most and the flavor of the salmon the most. Blue fish texture was not bad, but the taste was!

After a half hour….

Round 3.
Blue fish tasted worse and worse. Still liked the texture of the bass the most and the taste of the salmon the most.

I concluded that I liked the Bass and the Salmon equally; the bass for its texture, and the salmon for its taste. I think I didn’t like the Blue Fish because it was a fattier fish. It would have been useful for this experiment to know exactly what time each was caught and have more specifics as to where. Also, It would have been useful to have each the exact same weight as well having the cut from the same place on the fish in order to draw conclusion as to why I liked what I did. 

The three filets. From left to right: Bass, Salmon, Blue Fish

Marinade 

Filets on the pan

Covered pan with tinfoil and oven settings

Final Product!

-Liza Zipursky

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