YFT for fish tacos?

[Brewcrafter]

I have heard tell of ray being "cookie-cuttered" and sold as scallops, but not sure if that is "old wives tale" or reality.

[jurelometer]

Skate needs to be processes and handled correctly form catch to to kitchen, and it doesn't hold for long, but the taste is distinct, often compared to scallop - that is where the story comes from.  But fake/skate scallops are probably just a rumor, as the texture is too different, and the effort to make and short shelf-life of the fake scallopss would not be worth it.

Skate tastes like something between shellfish and shark to me, with an interesting texture (perfect for machaca). There are classic skate dishes in several cultures, some of which are considered high cuisine.  Lots of skate species, so some are probably better than others.

Although I think it is illegal now, mobula (a smaller cousin to the manta) is fished commercially and dried to make machaca in Baja.  I have seen stacks of carcasses on a couple of the more remote islands in the sea of Cortez.

And then there are the more common stingray species  that Alex mentioned. 

Only tried skate myself.  It was good, but not my favorite.  I usually avoid the shark/ray species, mostly for conservation reasons, but not being a full fledged fan of the taste makes it easier.

-J

[steelfish]

my favorite is stingray / skate /eagle ray machaca, because of the type of meat you can prepared the dish and it will look pretty similar to Beef.

Alijandro,

We catch a lot of the above, well I don't know what a Ray Machaca is, while Halibut fishing up here.
Kind of like riding a Moped, fun till your friends see you, fun to fight till you see what they are.
How do you clean a skate/ray for table fare?
Steve

I really dont know which type of ray or manta is the "best" for machaca dish either LOL, in this part of baja I have heard people use Diamond stingray and Bat ray for table fare, the to clean them is kind of hard to explan but its "kinda" similar to cleaning a Halibut, were you cut the fish into to get 4 big fillets, 2 from upper side the another 2 from the bottom side, but better check a youtube video on how to fillet a batray

[steelfish]

compadre Bill,

YFT get my approval to make nice Baja Style fish tacos (if thats worth anything  )

I happen to have some fillets from schooli YFT that were sent directly from "La Bocana" Baja Sur (few hours south of Guerrero Negro) from a good friend.
As I told you in my previous comment, the meat feels really firm pretty similar to a YT meat.
yesterday it was like any given Sunday and my wife told me that she would like to use some of the YFT to make fish tacos, I told them excellent idea but let me document the process for a Friend.

Im not going to put the whole recipe because its pretty basic, just battered fish with your personal condiment touch but use Beer instead of water or milk to prepare the batter mix for a crispy crunch.
pictures are not to win a showing-off contest because it was just a lazy meal to keep watching movies on a lazy sunday but you will get the idea.


clean loins of YFT



small chunks but not too thin



you will get something like this


you can perform quality control with some just made Guacamole, only avocado mildly smashed



yep, they're good to go !


let make the rest of the fish


basic ingredients, lettuce, pico de gallo sauce, lemons, guacamole and sour creame not in the pic


since Im from the North of Mexico I prefer flour tortillas    but of course you can use Corn tortillas which BTW I used for the second round of tacos  , my tortillas look ugly because I like to heat them on direct flame until have them "kin of" burned which make it to have soft and crunchy zones (yeah I know, Im picky with my food), normal people use a comal (pan) to just warm the tortillas until have them soft.
 


on the Baja restaurants when ordering Fish tacos additional with those ingredients on my pic, you will get catsup, mustard, mayo and different kind of hot sauces as option for the fish taco, depending on the 1st bite I can add a bit of mustard or not.

PS: after 6 fish tacos you in order to keep you healthy, you can continue without tortillas and eat the fish as finger food with the rest of Guacamole and sour cream and finish with a big Ice Cream dessert, yep, thats the correct recipe.     

[Crab Pot]

Now I'm hungry Alijandro!

[Bill B]

Darn Alex that looks great.  I did make yft tacos today, shredded   pan fried the fish with a generous amount of Tony Chacheri Cajun seasoning,  sour cream/mayo sauce, sliced radishes, homemade Pico de Gallo, cilantro,  red cabbage, and a splash of lime.  Corn tortillas to wrap it all up.  I would have taken pictures but the family beat me to it.  Everyone was really happy with the yft.  Next up will be the Baja style.  Bill