Van Gogh Bloaters-on-a-Piece-of-Yellow-Paper-1889

Bloaters are a type of whole cold- smoked herring. Bloaters are "salted and lightly smoked without gutting, giving a characteristic slightly gamey flavour" and are particularly associated with Great Yarmouth,

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. Popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries, the food is now described as rare. Bloaters are sometimes called Yarmouth bloater, or, jokingly, as a Yarmouth

capon A capon (from la, cāpō, genitive ''cāpōnis'') is a cockerel ( rooster) that has been castrated or neutered, either physically or chemically, to improve the quality of its flesh for food, and, in some countries like Spain, fattened by for ...

, two-eyed steak, or Billingsgate

pheasant Pheasants ( ) are birds of several genera within the family Phasianidae in the order Galliformes. Although they can be found all over the world in introduced (and captive) populations, the pheasant genera native range is restricted to Eurasia ...

(after the

Billingsgate Fish Market Billingsgate Fish Market is located in Canary Wharf in London. It is the United Kingdom's largest inland fish market. It takes its name from Billingsgate, a ward in the south-east corner of the City of London, where the riverside market was or ...

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

). The bloater is associated with England, while kippers share an association with

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

and the

Isle of Man ) , anthem = "O Land of Our Birth" , image = Isle of Man by Sentinel-2.jpg , image_map = Europe-Isle_of_Man.svg , mapsize = , map_alt = Location of the Isle of Man in Europe , map_caption = Location of the Isle of Man (green) in Europe ...

(the Manx kipper). Bloaters are "salted less and smoked for a shorter time" while kippers are "lightly salted and smoked overnight"; both dishes are referred to as ''red herring''. According to George Orwell in ''

The Road to Wigan Pier ''The Road to Wigan Pier'' is a book by the English writer George Orwell, first published in 1937. The first half of this work documents his sociological investigations of the bleak living conditions among the working class in Lancashire and Yor ...

'', "The Emperor

Charles V Charles V may refer to: * Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor (1500–1558) * Charles V of Naples (1661–1700), better known as Charles II of Spain * Charles V of France (1338–1380), called the Wise * Charles V, Duke of Lorraine (1643–1690) * Infa ...

is said to have erected a statue to the inventor of bloaters." They are given the name "bloater" since they are swelled, or "bloated" in preparation.

Bucklings, bloaters and kippers

All three are types of smoked herring.

Buckling In structural engineering, buckling is the sudden change in shape ( deformation) of a structural component under load, such as the bowing of a column under compression or the wrinkling of a plate under shear. If a structure is subjected to a ...

is hot-smoked whole; bloaters are cold-smoked whole;

kippers A kipper is a whole herring, a small, oily fish, that has been split in a butterfly fashion from tail to head along the dorsal ridge, gutted, salted or pickled, and cold-smoked over smouldering wood chips (typically oak). In the United Kin ...

are split and gutted, and then cold-smoked.

References

{{herrings English cuisine Fish processing Food preservation Oily fish Smoked fish Herring dishes

Bucklings, bloaters and kippers

See also

References