Alan Davidson

Matelote

Appears in
Oxford Companion to Food
Oxford Companion to Food

By Alan Davidson

Published 2014

  • About

Matelote a kind of fish stew of which the best-known manifestations in France, its home territory, are those made with carp or eel. Generally, it is made with freshwater fish.

The term had migrated into English by the first half of the 18th century, and for a time had a wider meaning, e.g. a stew in which the main ingredient could be something other than fish.

The term patently derives from matelot, sailor; so it is odd that it is rarely used to mean a stew of sea fish.

© the Estate of Alan Davidson 1999, 2006, 2014 © in the Editor’s contribution to the second and third editions, Oxford University Press 2006, 2014.