I received a nice piece of salted Icelandic herring from a friend and was told to soak overnight in water, clean (de-gut), filet, chop into pieces and put into olive oil. Which I did. I just realized I didn’t remove the skin. With a sinking feeling I looked online about how to deal with whole herring and they all seem to say to remove the skin.
Mine is already in bite size chunks soaking in olive oil, ready to slap on dark bread, but with the skin on. It would be very difficult, methinks, to skin them now. All those oily little pieces.
So- is this ruined? Is it fine? I’m terrified of biting into it and it being like eelskin- super tough and leathery, and I’m imagining having to scrape the flesh off of the tough skin with my teeth… That would be icky.
If someone in the know can let me know, I would be very grateful!!!
I haven’t prepared herrings like that, but many other fishes are prepared similarly without taking off the skin; the canned herrings I’ve had had their skin on. If it wasn’t descaled and you didn’t descale it, you can either eat the scales or scrape them off.
Thanks for the response! I’ve been waiting with bated breath!.. Just to be clear- this herring won’t be cooked- it was salted, soaked in water and now is sitting in olive oil, and will be eaten raw. Or at least that’s the plan. If it is inedible due to skin I left on, and it’s too much hassle to remove it in this state, I am considering just frying them. Light coating of flour, some garlic powder and pepper. I’m certain the skin will be fine to eat after frying. But- Was the canned herring you had cooked? I’m kind of assuming it was…they don’t can raw fish, do they?
There were no scales on the fish, I am sure of that. Eat the scales? Really?
Anything canned is cooked. Many foods are placed in the cans or jars when raw, and the processing time to properly can the product cooks everything thoroughly.
If you try to fry your oil-soaked herring, drain it completely, and pat it dry with paper towels. Otherwise, any flour or breading you put on will slide completely off when you try to fry it. In fact, I’d suggest frying it without any flour or breading.
~VOW
When I eat pickled herring, it’s always got the skin on. It’s descaled, but skin-on is the norm for herring. For me, the skin is as important as the flesh for good flavor.
That picture of those rollmops you linked to does indeed look the herring is raw. I just may have the courage to try my misfired concoction now! In the event that the skin is edible or agreeable, I will fry the lot and take VOW’s advice to do it unadorned, except for some powdered garlic and black pepper.
I like fish skin too, but have only had it on fried fish, for the most part.
And as to your question: YES, and I DON’T KNOW! I thought about this too when I got home, opened it up and realized that though the fish was headless, the abdomen was still in tact. I was a little put off by this. I will say this, though- it wasn’t stinky and even the guts which I pulled out didn’t reek obviously. So based on the lack of smell I’m thinking ‘not that long’.
