Plaice

Plaice (Pleuronectes platessa) is the workhorse flatfish of northern European cooking — a diamond-shaped, right-eyed flatfish of the North Atlantic whose olive-brown upper side is freckled with bright orange-red spots and whose underside is a clean, bright white. It is the fish the British and Dutch reach for when Dover sole is too dear: sweet-fleshed, fine-grained, and tender, with a low fat content that makes it one of the most delicate of all European flatfish. Because the flesh carries so little oil, plaice rewards short, gentle cooking and resents anything that drives moisture out of it, which is why it is most often pan-fried briefly in butter, poached in a light court-bouillon, or grilled skin-side down until just opaque.

The defining characteristic in the kitchen is texture. A correctly cooked plaice fillet should flake into soft, moist layers with the lightest pressure from a fork; the moment it pushes back dry and cottony, it has gone a minute too far. The skin, left on, crisps into a savory shell that protects that delicate flesh and adds the only real textural contrast on the plate — a fact that drives almost every classical preparation, from French meunière to the Dutch schol met spek, where bacon fat bastes the lean flesh as it fries.

Plaice is at its best from autumn through early spring, when fish are in peak condition after summer feeding and spawning runs bring them close to shore in quantity, and the same fish behaves well cold — poached, skinned, and dressed with mayonnaise or vinaigrette — making it a fixture of Scandinavian summer tables. For a cook, it is a fish that punishes overhandling and rewards restraint: a hot pan, a slick of butter, a squeeze of lemon, and almost nothing else.