Sunday, November 12, 2006

Fried Smelt

When I first moved to New England in the early 80's, Buffalo Wings hadn't yet migrated from Upstate NY to here. My pub food of choice became fried smelt.

We used to play hoops then go over to some dive in Warren, which I cannot name, not for the life of me. I would invariably order and wolf down an order of fried smelts. They were bite-sized, about the size of my thumb. You would dip them in hot sauce and eat them whole. Delicious! That was the only place I ever remember seeing fried smelt on the menu.

Last night, my daughter took me to dinner at Newick's to celebrate my birthday. Imagine my surpise and delight to see fried smelt on the appetizer menu. I then proceed to trip down memory lane, no doubt boring my poor daughter near to tears.

Of course, we ordered them. When they were arrived, they were much different than I remembered. They were bigger than my thumb, um about the size of a different appendage. The heads had been chopped off. They were deep-fried, but not crunchy.

They were tasty, but I was oddly disappointed. They also served a huge plateful of them and my daughter didn't like them, so I ate way too many...

I now have to try and recreate my long-remembered, small, crunchy smelt at home...

Right after I figure out how to make Apple Kudla...

1 Comments:

At 10:10 AM, Blogger Pete Lyons said...

When I was 15 I ordered Smelts once without knowing what they were. I was in Michigan and figured it was just chunks of fried fish. When the plate of battered fish bodies arrived I was shocked. I ate them but it took some nerve. I've never had them since, and after your description, I don't know if I could - that appendage analogy was a doozy.

 

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