Why are uk supermarkets so rubbish at fish?!

[frogsoup]

The first picture is of our local sainburys fish counter at about 7.30pm on Thursday evening - monumentally crap, right? It looks like the kind of fish counter you'd expect up some mountain, 500 miles from the sea, where the only available transport is by horse and cart. The second is from a Spanish Carrefour (copied randomly from spanishfoodblog) and looks pretty much like every large supermarket in France and Spain that I've ever seen - ie fully stocked with a mouthwatering range of incredible fresh fish and shellfish. Even at their best UK fish counters are usually pretty shit. We don't have a single fishmonger locally either, despite living in a city of 125,000 people, less than 50 miles from a major port. WTF is wrong with uk supermarket buyers?!

UK consumer won’t pay the same prices as Spanish consumer for fish.

Your typical brit is terrified of fish.

Industrial revolution innit.

That's probably true, but those gigantic uncooked prawns from the Carrefour look like they are a shade over 10 euros a kg. That is a hell of a lot less than you'd pay here.

Most people in the UK don't know how to cook fish unless it's coated in breadcrumbs. On the continent they're just better at cooking than us.

I bet the Carrefour fish counter doesn't look like that at 7 30 pm either

Is it as simple as we don't buy it so they don't sell it? I wonder if it's that seafood in the UK is seen as posh, so not for your average punter, whereas on the continent it's fair game for everyone.

I agree with you OP. I was thinking exactly the same in the supermarket today. It's a shame. I go to a local fishmonger and pay a bleedin fortune for fish but they have a fabulous selection. I occasionally buy salmon from Sainsbury's etc but it's just not the same

Soulrider admittedly I caught it at a particularly bare moment, but it is barely any more impressive at 2pm.

My local Morrisons has a great fish counter and really knowledgeable staff.

Yes it is. DH does some work for some fish businesses in the UK, that’s pretty much the size of it.

Ahh we don't have a morrisons anywhere near us, but I have heard they do quite good fish. I have never, ever seen anywhere in the UK even begin to approach your bog-standard continental supermarket fish display though.

FourFox that's depressing :(

I think it's quite reasonable that there's nothing there at 7.30 pm tbh. I would be more worried if they were leaving it out overnight.
Morrisons is pretty good, but with fish it does and always has come down to buying it at the peak times because fish that has been sitting round is not good.
I don't believe you can buy good fish all day anywhere. The shops and stalls in Italian cities are certainly done by the evening ime.

I see more people buying vacuum packed salmon off the shelf than I do buying fish from the fish counter. I put it down to the following:

• not knowing how to cook anything other than bog standard salmon and being scared to ask.

• not wanting to, you know, TALK to anybody when shopping.

• not knowing the price of a piece of fish from the counter before it goes on the scale, by which time they would be too embarrassed to say, “that’s more expensive than I thought”. The plastic packed stuff has a price on it.

I’ll always go to the counter because I think that the produce on it is better and because I want it to stay in the store, which it won’t if people don’t use it.

Sweeping generalisation 😒

Our local Waitrose one is ace and the large Sainsbury’s can be either very good or woeful. 7.30 at night though - is it a 24 hour store ?

Countess, even when it's full it's pretty rubbish!

I completely agree with you OP. DH and I frequently wish there was a fishmonger nearby (there isn't for miles) as the supermarket is so dire. It's such a shame - we're an island nation!

Then don't go to Sainsburys!

Platypus I challenge you to find me a single supermarket in the UK, Waitrose included, that looks like that Carrefour one. The French Carrefour I used to live near has about six fish counters, no exaggeration - all filled to the brim. Vivier tanks, live shellfish, the works. It's a big supermarket, but nothing out of the ordinary. It may be a generalisation but the contrast is incredibly stark.

We use a fishmonger a couple of towns away.
I’m not big on fish (the bones in a lot of fish put me right off an entire meal) but will eat it because dp likes it, but I love shellfish.
Supermarkets close to me seem to have limited selection I agree.
And dp is in heaven at supermarkets abroad with their extensive array of produce!

It's a loss leader in most supermarkets. Brits like to see it in supermarkets but only a small percentage buy fresh.

Many brits are dead squeamish about fish.
Not generalising at all.

TheCountess I could try Asda, Tesco, Aldi, all nearby, and have no better luck. The waitrose is a big better in range but the entire counter is still teeny-tiny. I think it's true, Brits just don't really buy fish.

I used to work on a supermarket fish counter and it just never sold at full-price. That's probably why they don't bother having a full counters worth out - it's just a total waste of money.

I suppose we're spoilt here having Morrisons, and obviously you are right that UK supermarkets don't shift nearly as much as in southern European countries, but it doesn't really matter if there are massive heaps or not, does it? You want turnover with fish and ime the fresher places are the ones that judge it right and run out rather than overstock and let it sit around.

adaline that's interesting. Such a shame!