Little did we know when we moved to the Midlands that it would be so difficult to get fresh fish. Ireland is an island after all, so you’d expect to be able to get fresh fish anywhere, right? Even here in North Tipperary it is only an hour to the coast.
Well you can’t. Local supermarkets stock a very limited amount of fish, and I’m sorry to say of dubious origin. They may have some salmon and a little bit of white fish. We have had van salesmen call selling ‘fresh’ fish…. however, it is all frozen ‘square-shaped’ fish, drenched in some god awful sauce. Not buying that.
For the past 15 years we’ve just got into the habit of buying fresh fish on every trip to Galway. We invested in a plug in fridge for the car. This is not an ideal situation, we buy lots of fish, then come home and freeze it, but at least we know it was fresh (and where it was from) when it went into the freezer.
THEN…. along came #eatmorefish, the brain-child of Gannet Fishmongers in Galway.
Since late last year we can now order fish weekly, and it is delivered to the Organic Store in Birr for us to collect each week. We order by mid-day Wednesday, and it is delivered (by post – this fascinates me!) to the shop for us to collect on Thursday afternoon.
Of course, the first week we ordered we went completely overboard on the amount we bought.
We’ve now got the hang of it, so order 2 or 3 meals per week … on average about €20 spend per week. The system has encouraged to try different types of fish that are available, and, of course, try out new recipes! In recent weeks we’ve had clams, mackerel, and red mullet. We are looking forward to trying lots more.
Mackerel with salsa
This is why the statistic from Thursday night’s What Are You Eating programme that on average Irish people spend 84 c per week on fish, just shocked me!
Do you buy fish? What would your weekly spend be?
A Year In Redwood 
We should eat more fish. But it is a struggle to get fresh fish regularly. Local grocers are doing better though.
It is crazy that Ireland as an island nation has such a poor quality of fish in the Midlands!
We eat fish at least twice a week. Blessed here in Dublin with some great independent fishmongers. The supermarkets continue to get it all wrong. If you can get that bad smell of fish as you approach the fish counter, walk on by. Fresh fish doesn’t smell.
We are able to have fish at least twice a week now. When we were bulk buying we were almost ‘saving’ it, as we didn’t know when we’d be able to replenish stocks!
I remember trying to buy mussels in Bantry in 1999, found some from a seller on the side of the road on the way to Glengariff 🙂
It is so crazy that for an island, buying fish can be so difficult. When I was growing up in Dublin, my Mum used to go to Howth on a Thursday to buy from the boats… don’t think you can do that anymore, but there are lots of fish shops along the pier there.
It is still a common practice in smaller piers and harbours of Brittany. Yes, one of the big Irish paradoxes. I am also hyper fussy when it comes to buying fish, so it’s not easy. Great fishmongers in Navan and Mullingar.
We too are fussy, which was why we drove an hour and a half to Galway to buy our fish. This eatmorefish system is great though, I can only recommend it.
Thanks for the tip!