I should add-Going off the menu is always an adventure, and almost always more expensive. Once at an African restaurant my wife asked for a combination(I think it was just different veggies) that was similar to my 11 Euro dish. When we received the bill, it was almost twice as much and more expensive than anything on the menu. Often I point to the dish I want so there is no confusionwhen the bill comes.

For future reference:

1 lb - .45 kg, or 2.2 lbs to the kilo.

I have in my fridge a boneless fillet of salmon, of .278 kg; this is a little over half a pound (.61 pounds to be exact.)

Depending on the size of one's appetite, this fillet would feed one or two adults. (The fillet is about 3.5 by 5 by 1 inch, and has the very thin skin typical of salmon).

If I were buying it as part of a whole, ungutted fish, I'd have to bear in mind that for salmon, one gets about 60 per cent of the landed weight as edible portion - so I'd guess about .5 kg or a little over a pound to yield this much fillet. Salmon gets a higher yield than many other species (e.g. for cod, you only get about 40 per cent of the landed weight as a skinless fillet, or just under 50 per cent for a fillet with skin.)

What I'd like to know, LynAk, is this: you say "they brought out several fish on a tray." What exactly were you buying by the kilo? Was the price per kg quoted for skinned and trimmed fillet, trimmed fillet, whole ungutted fish with head on; whole gutted fish with head on; whole gutted fish with head off, etc. etc. Because it's gonna make a WHOLE lotta difference to the value, as I've tried to point out.

(By the way, I'm not paying more than a few eurocents per kg for a fish head, I don't care if a three star Michelin chef whacked it off with a knife in his or her kitchen and boiled it in a sterling silver pot.)

And thanks for the heads up. I was glad to have been similarly warned about ordering beef by the kg in Florence. It's too easy for the consumer to make assumptions about what exactly they are buying. I'm not saying this was a scam, exactly, but I do think it is a bit of a marketing gimmick.

She was paying for the entire fish, which was probably boned and filetted tableside, so no chance to weigh it then.

If you get up early enough in the morning in Italy, you will see restaurateurs at the local fish market, buying fish. (Where I live, you can watch large fish being wheeled off the docks in wheelbarrows, straight through the front doors of restaurants).

The owner of the restaurant has to pay for the whole fish. When he shows you the tray of fish, and you pick one, you are buying that fish. You will pay what he paid for the fish, plus pay him to cook it for you and serve it to you.

Have none of you ever eaten in a lobster house where you pick your own lobster? Do you call it a scam when the restaurant doesn't subtract the shell and other inedible parts when charging you for a 2 pound lobster?

Sue_xx_yy, I've never heard of showing whole fish then pricing by the weight AFTER dressing and/or preparing in a restaurant. Clearly the price by the weight for a whole fish is for the WHOLE fish!

How would one make a whole fish weigh more - pour water down its throat?

Economically-speaking, it makes no difference whether they charge by the kilo before or after gutting, dressing, etc. If they priced it by weighing it after it was cleaned, beheaded, etc., the per-kg price would just be a little higher.

LynAK - Wow! This post is a doozie. It has seriously taken flight. I looked to the left and noticed it had 72 responses. Funny how it's often tough to get that much feedback to ones questions and/or trip report in general. LOL

That shouldn't be surprising, ChicagoDallasGirl. You want to get a lot of responses to your post? Just admit you made an error and people will flock by the dozens to tell you how dumb you are. Particularly all the people making sure everyone knows that THEY could never do anything that "uneducated" themselves.

So.. how many people did this particular fish serve? Was it a local fish?

Naw...It was a Basa from China, Congelato, (frozen)

It obviously was a fresh fish, as it was presented on a tray. That does not mean it was a local fish from the lagoon.

Seriously , probably Bronzino, maybe Spigola, or Ombrina; most other local fish from the Adriatic side are too small to serve individually.

Thanks LynAK for posting this information.
As someone that very rarely eats fish in a restaurant,(but eats loads at home) I too would not have thought to ask how heavy the bit I am getting is and subsequently how much its going to be.

However I did once have the pleasure of paying for my daughters King prawns at about £2.00 each in CZ . That was a surprise too.

And to add I'm with Patrick, the OP is merely passing on info to us, coz that's what this forum is for...isn't it?

;-)

Muck

But was this even a local fish? They use a lot of imports in Venice these days.

....and lots of farmed fish, too.

"..please weigh the bones, including the head, and subtract it from the cost of the fish thank you...."

I'd love to be in the room to see the reaction to that request....

This business of dressed versus undressed fish is all starting to sound somewhat risque. I have in mind a fish doing a striptease.....

I can see everyone is quite confused! I was trying to suggest a way of determining how much fish to order. This is pretty crucial if one wants to be able to control costs (which I gather was the thrust of LynAK's warning.) I thought it would be of help to others in the future,is all. Plus, doing these kinds of computations is also essential if one wants an idea of the value of the product one is ordering.

A whole fish that is undressed is going to deliver different yields of edible product, depending on just how 'undressed' it is. So to determine how much fish you need to order, and in turn to estimate the cost, you need to pay close attention to what exactly is being presented as 'whole undressed fish'.

Yes, dmlove, it could make a substantial difference. A fish presented without head and guts included means that, for a given amount of fillet, you're going to need to order - my guess is, at least 20 per cent less product than if the fish were presented with head and guts. (I'm assuming it would still have the bones and the skin.) So, since we would need to order 20 per cent less, it follows we would pay 20 per cent less.

zeppole, I take your point that lobster sold as whole product, complete with inedible portions, is standard marketing. However, this is not at the whim of the restaurant but because they have little other choice: it is darn near impossible to sell fresh uncooked lobster as 'filleted' meat (darn difficult to separate the meat from a completely uncooked lobster, thanks to the way it adheres to the shell.) So, I am less inclined to condemn this practice as a marketing gimmick (which in any case, I don't consider to be as serious a thing as a scam.)

Plus, there is less chance of confusion when estimating yield price because lobster is not only routinely marketed per pound or kg, but whole fresh, uncooked lobster is always sold (or should be sold) LIVE. Thus, there is no variation in how the thing would be displayed, pre-cooking, to the consumer. It's always going to have it's head, guts, exoskeleton etc. included. This means the yield will always be the same - around 40 per cent (maybe a little better if you are a real zealot and harvest the meat from the legs as well as the tail and claws.)

Good one, Patrick!

Oh, for heaven's suze. If you want to persist in believing that when you select a whole fish from a tray in an Italian restaurant and you are subsequently charged what the restauranter paid for the whole fish this is somehow a "scam" or a "gimmick," go right ahead.

Yes, the fish was probably cleaned before it was shown to the customers. So they might -- gasp! -- be charged for scales, guts and exo-skeleton they never saw! What a rip-off (literally). At least they got to look at the eyeballs.

For your own sanity, when you're in Italy, if you want fish, stick to tuna and swordfish, which are usually sold as filets.

Sue_xx_yy, your points are well taken, and yes that is the issue with ordering something by the weight when most people really don't have a clue. But one doesn't say "I want a kilogram of fish". One points to the fish and says, "I'll take that one". The vast majority of us I'm sure wouldn't begin to know how much fish to order by weight either dressed or undressed (I do like the above striptease reference). On the other hand most of us have a better handle on it, by looking at a whole fish and thinking "after the head comes off and it's cleaned this should be enough or two much or not enough for two of us".

But if the waiter has said the fish is so much per kg, then it merely takes pointing to a fish and say "about how much would this one weigh"?