RoundGoby cooking event goes live!

The first cooking event took place during last autumn’s Kalmar sustainability week, where four public kitchen chefs cooked with round goby for the very first time. The outcome?  Four completely different but nevertheless tasty dishes.

The chefs were thrilled with the results and decided to take part in another cooking event, this time with external stakeholders. Around 40 people attended the event in Kalmar, including representatives from Kalmar Country Administration Board, politicians, municipal procurement and purchasing managers, public kitchen managers and chefs from different municipalities in the region.

Participants had the opportunity to taste five different dishes, a breaded and fried fillet served with a cold herb sauce, “Branteviksgoby” – a pickled round goby in herbs as well as a ceviche and a carpaccio with beetroot. A highlight was the “Sea & Land” fish balls made from a mixture of round goby and legumes mince – an extra point for sustainability!

An extra shoutout to our project partners Rosbergs Fisk that prepared the fillets and mince and Skillinge Fisk that provided their homemade Branteviksgoby for participants to try.

Overall participants were highly positive towards the dishes, with the breaded, fried fish fillets, the Branteviksgoby as well as the Sea & Land fish balls taking first, second and third place, all scoring at least 4 starts out of 5.

One of the chefs, Annefrid, had fun cooking with a product that was previously completely unknown to her, and she looks forward to the participant’s feedback on the dishes created at the event.

Local media was also interested with the local radio channel P4 Kalmar broadcasting live from the event, interviewing both project coordinator Hannes and the one of chefs, Carl.

When asked about whether it is safe to eat an invasive species, Hannes responded: “Invasive might not sound so tasty but it’s just a regular fish that ended up in the wrong place as a result of human activity”

Carl explains why he’s interested in cooking with round goby: I was positively surprised the first time I cooked with round goby. It was easy to handle and tasted great. We should focus more on sustainability and improving our environment, it’s about our future and utilising the resources that are actually available”.

Initially a sceptic, the radio journalist Olle decided to try the fried and breaded fish and was pleasantly surprised: “It’s just like another fish such as cod. It looks nice and tastes good”.

The quest continues to find out which dishes would work with a broader public and how to sustainably utilise round goby whilst keeping costs down. RoundGoby partners will continue to explore ways optimise the processing and develop new products that will be showcased at different events, so keep your eyes peeled!

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