I know-tilapia is a pond raised fish…but they are not bottom feeders. But every time I have bought tilapia fillets, I find they have a muddy taste. Curiously, when deep fried, this taste goes away.
I’ve never noticed such a taste. Then again I don’t really know what mud tastes like.
In fact, my biggest complaint about tilapia is that I can’t really detect a flavor of it much at all. It’s nice for seasoning however you want though (like tofu or chicken).
It just sort of…does. There’s a lot of talk about how the organic stuff doesn’t have that problem but I can tell you from personal experience that it’s exactly the same, and one time, worse - both frozen and fresh.
One of the more popular hypotheses is that it tastes like that because it can sometimes be a bottom feeder. Catfish, another bottom feeder, has the same problem.
Deep-frying involves batter, which probably also means citrus and/or tartar sauce - which would have covered the muddy taste.
IMO it’s cheap, but not worth the trouble. Buy a can of tuna.
Hmmm… I have never noticed it either. I just had some last week, baked with lemon & dill and it was delicious. Of course, I was raised eating catfish and it is my very favorite fish… one of my very favorite FOODS. So that may have something to do with it.
Tilapia is a tasteless trash fish that tastes like whatever you put on it, or whatever it’s been in contact with. I suspect you are simply tasting the tastelessness of the fish itself. Deep fried, you’re tasting the fried oil with some fish sauce.
Having fished out all the really tasty fish (snapper, roughy, cod, halibut, tuna) the fishing industry is now trying to get us to eat a fish they spent generations trying to keep out of their nets and dumping by the ton. I refuse to spend money on it, either grocery or restaurant. Tell them to use the old carp recipe and just bring you the fixin’s that represent the flavor.
(Nail carp to a board. Clean and behead. Apply lemon, pepper and dill copiously. Bake for 1 hour at 350 degrees. Throw away the fish and eat the board.)
10 years ago I thought tilapia tasted like crap and had a mushy texture. Last year I started eating it and find it somewhat tasty with a firm nice texture.
I never noticed much flavor in tilapia at all. It’s not really one of my favorites, and when I do use it it’s usually in something highly seasoned, not just simple broiled fish. Most tilapia come from fish farms which may have something to do with any muddy flavor noticed.
Have you actually tasted mud? I did as a kid, and it tastes nothing like tilapia. Mud has more flavor.
And how in the world does Firefox not know the word tilapia?
I’d suspect changing taste, especially comparative, as well as the tilapia probably being fresher and being prepared in a more appetizing way. Ten years ago, it was probably frozen for six months, thawed poorly and fixed as a low-end menu item. The one you have today is likely fresh or at least only partially frozen and prepared as a front-line item.
I further suspect, though, that if you were to be served a half-portion of truly tasty fish and a half-portion of tilapia, the latter would seem more mushy and tasteless than you now perceive. I dunno about anyone else, but it’s probably been a decade since I had a truly first-rate dinner filet like snapper or roughy.
Never noticed a mud flavor in it. For me it’s the iceberg lettuce of fish. Very mild, neutral flavor. The fishes I would sometimes characterize as “muddy” in flavor are catfish and carp.
Although, according to this, tilapia is also associated with the muddy flavor. I’ve never had muddy flavored tilapia that I know of.
ETA: Oh, I suppose I should also quote the answer to the OP:
I’ve certainly noticed what the OP talks about, though I would have descibed it as a “soapy” taste. So that even though I approve of the concept of a mild, white fish, I’m not particularly fond of tilapia as a representative of that genre.
When I buy tilapia, I look for the fillets that are the least red. The ones with the most red in them don’t taste as good to me.
If you want soapy taste, try some lutefisk. It’s literally soap.
Local rockfish off the southern Ca coast are still by far my favorite. But I will take tilapia over sole and even the fish they now pass off as cod which I suspect is not really cod. For those who have not tried it recently I would ask you give it another shot, to me it has improved remarkably.
I thought we were supposed to be fighting ignorance, not spreading it.
It’s unlikely that tilaipa was somehow saltwater bycatch from fishing for the species you mention, considering that it’s a freshwater fish from Africa.
The thing with tilapia is that they’re easy to farm- they’re vegetarian and fast growing, and are well suited to warm climates.
The reason they taste like dirt is the same reason that catfish do; a compound called geosmin which produced by bacteria and is responsible for the dirt taste of beets and that earthy smell after rain.
I bet the fried tilapia you had was marinated in buttermilk or something acidic before cooking; that breaks down the compound.
My Norwegian ancestors *humpf *at you and offer you some fresh lefse.
Conceded. There are other trash fish now commercially caught and I made my comment too sweeping.
It’s still a tasteless trash fish and I think trying to give it the high sell based on what goo it’s drowned in needs to pass.
Both tilapia and catfish are staples in the Filipino diet. A muddy-tasting fish is a sick one, as one fisheries professional told me. The local term is “lasang gilik.” The flesh is already poisoned due to lack of oxygen, caused by overfeeding in crowded ponds or some other reason. Healthy pond-raised fish should have no such taste.
I don’t know if I find the taste to be muddy, but more algae-y. I find that if you have a whole fillet (with the thicker, bigger piece and the thinner, narrower piece), if you split it the length of the fillet and cut off the bloodline, it takes most of that flavor away.
Tilapia isn’t that bad, as long as you buy it cheap in bulk, and understand that it’s basically just tasteless protein that goes with anything, as long as it’s heavily spiced. It’s the fish equivalent of a bag of frozen chicken breasts. Wouldn’t pay for it in a restaurant, though.
I can throw a chicken boob and a tilapia slab under the broiler without the slightest bit of spice or condiment, and the chicken will be tasty and edible with no more than a dash of salt. The fish will be inedibly bland.
There are many sources of cheap, bulk, tasty protein without resorting to the grocery equivalent of MREs, at any price.