Signs of high summer - jelly on the move!

Someone might want to provide a name for this beast from the deep in Sandown Bay, Isle of Wight shot courtesy of Mike from Captain Stan's Fish, Bembridge, Isle of Wight.

Chef's delight under a mackerrel sky!

There's no better way for a chef to get to know his ingredients than to see them in their natural habitat first hand - so when Prosenjit Bhattacharya from the Greenbank Hotel, Falmouth took a trip out with old mackerel hand Chris Morley in the early hours for a spot of handlining the chances are it would be smiles all round!

Prosenjit created a nicely observed image album that recorded the visit to Newlyn and trip aboard the Rachel & Paul.

Med Adventure bound away!

A chance to note how AIS can give an apparent track rather than a real one - the Med Adventure spent the night in Newlyn before heading off round the corner - only by clicking on each waypoint tracked in the AIS route will the times become apparent - otherwise the software just joins the dots over the last 24 hours!

Med adventure - nice thought!

Currently, the ILB has a good lead on its larger sibling in the call out stakes......
but on a Thursday evening some of the crew take to the water and race in the Bay, good to see the old hands like Mr Henderson (at the mast) give youngsters like Sam a chance to take it easy and man the helm......
a snip at around £2.4 million.....built by Farmont Yachts, Antalya, Turkey the Med Adventure was the first of a new series called "Trawler series" designed by Kevin Kerwin with interior design by Rene van der Velde and completed in 2004.

With a displacement of 100 tons, 21.32m long, a beam of 6.20m and a draft of 1.50m the two main engine are 480 hp Caterpillar 34306Cs which give he a maximum speed of 12 knots
and a range of 5.000 nm at 8 knots. She was making around 10 knots on her way from Cowes to Newlyn......
a very popular hull form in the US of A.......
with this particular design allowing those on board to take full advantage of the deck spaces aft......
op for'ard, the mini bulbous bow will at least shave something off the fuel costs, though at that price would you really worry too much?.......
meanwhile back on planet earth, the bots aboard the Ajax put their hard won efforts ashore, no doubt having enjoyed many of the sights of the sea at this time of year, dolphins and diving gannets to name but a few......
the monsters of the deep are blooming in the heat........
and the evening sky makes for an interesting mix of hues.

But I wanted it rare!

Here's a hot tip on how to tell the rareness (or otherwise ) of your fish - or steak for that matter. For this you'll need one of those bits of kitchen equipment that you never think you'll need until you do - the humble kitchen skewer - available from your local butcher - just ask. Apart from the obvious skewering of meat - what else would you use to pierce two holes in a coconut to get at that milk?

To determine the doneness of fish insert your humble metal skewer for 5 seconds through the side,

touch to your lip and if it is cold - yer steak is rare
if slightly warm - medium rare
quite warm - medium
hot - somewhere past medium
and if it burns your lip the chances are you'll have to start again but some blackness to the flesh may also give the game away......!

Flavour? what's that all about?

Ever wondered why some combinations of food and flavour work and some don't? Well now a new (and the only) book on the subject opens up a whole new world - the Flavour Thesaurus by Niki Segnit from Bloomsbury Books - and explains all. Designed to get the creative juices flowing, as much as inform, the book is a must or great gift for the foody in your life.

Fishy pairings inlude lobster and vanilla, watermelon and oyster and one that might surprise, pineapple and anchovy!

The book follows the form of Roget’s Thesaurus. The back section lists, alphabetically, 99 popular ingredients, and suggests classic and less well known flavour matches for each. The front section contains an entry for every flavour match listed in the back section and is organised into 16 flavour themes such a Bramble & Hedge, Green & Grassy, and Earthy. There are 980 entries in all and 200 recipes or suggestions are embedded in the text.

Ooh Betty!

Just in time to catch perfect scallop fishing weather - lots of sunshine and no wind - the Betty G II heads back to port. Read the full story over at FishSense, the UK fishing magazine.