Gastronomic Heritage in Mediterranean wetlands ebook

Fried eels
• Gut, clean and rinse eels well.
• Cut in 10cm pieces.
• Heat the olive oil in a pan. Roast the garlic for 30 seconds for extra flavour and
add the eels. Once cooked from the one side, turn them over.
• When they are nearly done, add the lemon juice, lower the heat and cover the
pan. After a couple of minutes, remove from heat.
• Serve with salad and bread or with pulses.
Tips & Interesting facts
Eels, or “asselia” in Cypriot Greek, were fished from rivers, usually near their
muddy estuaries or shallow water areas, as well as from swamps that existed
before the lowering of the aquifer due to pumping and the creation of dams. The
80 year-old cook Phaedra Andreou, (a refugee from the north-western part of
Cyprus to Polis of Chryssochous in the west where she lives since 1974) describes
that Cypriots always cooked them in a simple way. Eels were fished in many parts
of Cyprus. Her father and husband fished eels until the Evretou dam stopped
the flow of Chryssochous River some 30 years ago. They are now found in the
remaining streams and seasonal wetlands in limited numbers.
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