Fresh fish for the party: TV chefs set the trend
Created: 12/24/2021, 6:00 PM
From: Andreas Höger
Bernhard Heindl, chairman of the Holzkirchen fishing association, talks about the association's long tradition of selling fresh fish on Christmas Eve.
© Thomas Plettenberg
The Holzkirchen fishing association has had a tradition for 35 years or more: fresh fish is sold at the forest pond on Christmas Eve.
In an interview, Chairman Bernhard Heindl reveals how TV chefs influence the preferences of customers on Christmas Eve.
Holzkirchen
- As unbelievable as it sounds: In Christian tradition, Advent was considered to be Lent. Shortly before opulent meat dishes paid tribute to the birth of Christ on the Christmas holidays, the next festive dish was on the menu on Christmas Eve, the culmination of the pre-Christmas period: fish.
A tradition that the Holzkirchen fishing association has been serving for a long time.
On Christmas Eve in the morning - and also on Good Friday, by the way - fish is sold at the club ponds in Dietramszell.
"We have been doing this for 35 years," says Chairman Bernhard Heindl (57), who has been leading the association with 140 members for 16 years.
You are prepared for the day of the big battle on Christmas Eve.
As Heindl explains, the preparation not only includes smoking the day before, but also a look at what the TV chefs are currently doing.
Mr. Heindl, from 8 a.m. to 9.30 a.m. you sell fish at the Dietramszeller Waldweiher parking lot. Have you caught enough or do you have to hurry to get your carp, trout or char?
We don't fish the fish out of the forest pond for days.
We sell directly from our smaller rearing ponds.
They are lowered to a depth of 30 centimeters.
That way we can take the fish out in a targeted manner.
Do you only take them out when someone orders?
Freshly caught, exactly.
The fish are around two and a half years old.
At 400 grams, they are ready for slaughter.
What if there are other fish in the net too?
Then it's back into the water until it's his turn.
Where do the smoked trout come from?
We buy them from a company in Peißenberg.
They come slaughtered, we take care of the smoking ourselves. We have two or three specialists who smoke with passion.
This is really an art in itself.
For example, only beech wood is used.
Everything else does not work.
How is the demand?
The 300 smoked trout are usually gone after 30 minutes, so you should order in advance.
Otherwise we slaughter about 500 fish each time.
Are you dependent on walk-in customers or do you have regular customers?
Most of them are regular customers.
How well sales go depends on the weather.
The colder it is, the better it goes - no idea why.
At Christmas 2020 we also felt Corona.
There wasn't a vaccine yet, people were insecure.
I hope things go better this year.
Is it worth the effort?
Well, otherwise we wouldn't do it.
Selling fish on Christmas Eve and Good Friday covers around 30 percent of our costs for fish stocking and leasing.
How many members help with the sale?
We need around 25 men.
But they all like to come.
Women don't participate?
We actually only have three women in the club.
Fishing is a male domain.
I am surprised. We would be very happy to have female reinforcements.
Which fish are most in demand?
That changes all the time.
I'm at the sales booth myself and I know from many customers that they get a lot of inspiration from the TV chefs' appearances.
And that's true: a few years ago everyone suddenly wanted carp, then suddenly char.
Carp, char, trout: why not different species?
No, that doesn't work, we tried it once with pike.
We stayed seated on it.
Your favorite recipe?
Grilled trout, smeared with clarified butter, salt, pepper, paprika, not much fuss.
With a potato and cucumber salad.
And which fish will crown your Christmas Eve meal this year?
I'll tell you honestly: none at all.
For four days I only saw fish, fish, fish.
I'm fed up with that for now.
I leave what is available today to my wife.
Everything is fine with me - just no fish, please.