Snakehead Tastes Like Swordfish

Photo copyright 2012 by Helenah Swedberg.

I'm writing this from a very nice hotel room in mid-town Manhattan after a successful press dinner in support of the upcoming launch of 'Eating Aliens' and of Matthew Weingarten's forthcoming book, 'Preserving the Wild.' Matt and I each have books launching soon with Storey Publishing and someone had the clever idea of putting the crazy invasive species hunter together with the respected NYC chef and having us come up with dinner.

We had a great audience of people from print magazines, television and blogs that I read, watch and respect (more after the jump). Finally, an opportunity to put snakeheads, lionfish and Chinese mystery snails onto the palates of media outlets ranging from Outdoor Life to Time magazine (more after the jump).The clear winner of the night was the snakehead In Matt's capable hands the invasive Asian fish was a dead ringer for swordfish. The texture. The meaty, steak-like heft to it. In a blind taste test most of us (myself included) literally could not have told the difference.

So why are we still killing swordfish for the fish market instead of invasive snakeheads?

This event was a perfect taste for how I hope to conduct the book tour for Eating Aliens this fall. I don't want to sit there at a table in a book store, signing books. I want to work with talented chefs to put these invasive species in peoples' mouths, city by city, and prove that these things are worth eating.