trout

Trout is seasoned on both sides with salt/pepper/cayenne then pan-fried in olive oil for only a few minutes. The cook stands there and observes the change inside the cavity to determine when to flip and to remove.

These fish looked so good in the ice cabinet, I told the guy they looked happy to be there, and he roared laughing. It wasn't that funny. I guess they just don't hear many stupid things there at the fish counter. 

A sauce is prepared with olive oil, grated onion, grated garlic, diced tomato, salt/pepper, then butter and lime topped out with chopped parsley -- a sauce vierge, if you like, because I am a virgin, I mean, because the sauce is considered un-messed with. 

Usually, if you are more careful than myself, more delicate, adept, clever, and patient, you can cut along the dorsal line, then across at the head and the tail, cut off the fins, then lift off the filet from the skeletal ribs. Then the same to the other side. The result is two boneless filets and a perfect set of fishbones with head and tail, like you see in the cartoons when the cat is rooting around the garbage cans holding a lid to a garbage can as if it were a restaurant tray and with a napkin draped over his bent elbow, and picking out a fish skeleton as if it were a rare find and a great delicacy. It's fun! The fun is imitating the cartoon. Then you can triumphantly wave around the entire fish skeleton like a cartoon alley cat. Impress your kids. But my fish carcasses  didn't pull off that well this time and quite a lot of tiny bones were left in the filets that had to be dealt with one at a time. No big deal, it was just a constant reminder of my failure at being a cartoon.