Food and drink

The marine harvest that provides our weekly intake of health-giving fish varies enormously from country to country.

While in northern Europe the weekly ration was originally instituted for religious reasons, in Spain and other Mediterranean and Atlantic-bordering nations, fish is actually the preferred meal. Meat is not the favourite unless we live on Spain's north coast where the Basques and Galicians treat it with a reverence bordering on devotion. It is common currency to ask our lunching companions or guests whether they prefer fish or meat; their answer will decide which restaurant we visit.

There are few equivalents to exclusively fish restaurants outside Spain and other southern European countries. Northern Europeans eat mainly cod and haddock, although hake is coming back into favour, and all three species swim together. But haddock stocks are running low, necessitating controls on catches (no less than 30cm in length) and avoiding the breeding season.