Introduction to the Recipes

The North Atlantic region is so rich in seafood recipes that six volumes rather than half of one would be needed to give a full conspectus. But to provide this would be a dis-service to most people, who suffer as readily from a surfeit of recipes as they do from a surfeit of food. Moreover, even when space is severely limited, I believe that it would be a mistake to cram in as many recipes as possible. It is better to have five recipes set in some sort of background, whether personal or cultural or literary or geographical (using the word in a wide sense, to embrace the fauna and flora of a region as well as its coast, rivers or mountains), than to have ten which seem to have sprung naked and unexplained from the author’s brow, like Athene from the head of Zeus (or, as we are dealing with seafood, Aphrodite from the ocean foam), and whose real origin and context can only be guessed.