{"id":6156,"date":"2026-08-18T13:28:40","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T13:28:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/?p=6156"},"modified":"2026-08-18T14:31:41","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T14:31:41","slug":"sustainable-fish-5-catches-worth-discovering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/sustainable-fish-5-catches-worth-discovering\/","title":{"rendered":"Sustainable Fish: 5 Catches Worth Discovering"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Sustainable<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Sustainable Fish: 5 Catches Worth Discovering, that’s the idea behind rethinking what lands on your plate. Ask most people what fish they’re having for dinner, and you’ll hear the same few answers on repeat: salmon, sea bream, sea bass. Meanwhile, a handful of sustainable fish pulled straight from our own coastline sit largely ignored, despite being fresher, more affordable, and far easier on the marine environment. This is the gap the Explore the Variety, Eat Sustainable Fish campaign is trying to close. It’s a simple idea: the more we diversify what we eat, the less pressure we put on any single stock, and the more we support the people who fish these waters for a living.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s worth asking why this happens in the first place. Decades of supermarket habits and imported staples have trained us to associate “good fish” with a very short list of names, most of which aren’t even native to our waters. Salmon is farmed thousands of kilometres away. Sea bream and sea bass, while present locally, are also heavily farmed and imported at scale to meet demand. None of this makes them bad choices outright, but leaning on the same few species year-round concentrates fishing and farming pressure in ways that our own local stocks simply don’t need to face. Choosing sustainable fish instead offers a wider, healthier alternative one that’s been available all along, just overshadowed by habit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meet the Sustainable Core Five<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Start with a\u010b\u010bola, the greater amberjack; a powerful predator with dense, meaty flesh closer in texture to steak than to typical white fish, making it a natural swap for swordfish on the grill and one of the standout sustainable fish on this list. Then there’s sawrell, the humble horse mackerel, small and fast-breeding and found in huge numbers along our coast; fish like this can handle steady fishing far better than slower-growing predators, which makes eating more of them one of the simplest ways to eat sustainable fish. \u010ainturin, the scabbardfish, gets overlooked purely because of its shape; long, flat, and silver, like a ribbon of metal but once filleted it’s one of the most delicate white fish around, closer to sole than anything intimidating. Tumbrell, a compact relative of Bluefin tuna, delivers all the deep, savory flavor people love about tuna without the sustainability concerns, since it reproduces quickly and stays abundant. And kubrit, or little tunny, is easy to spot by the dark markings along its back; it thrives in warm coastal waters and grows fast, keeping it reliably available and another easy entry point into sustainable fish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What ties these five sustainable fish together isn’t just where they’re caught, but how well their populations can handle being eaten. Fast-growing, abundant, or lower on the food chain, each one offers a way to enjoy good seafood without adding strain to species that are already under pressure elsewhere. They’re also, in most cases, considerably cheaper than the imported staples they can replace a rare case where the more sustainable fish option is also the better value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Getting Them From Counter to Plate<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Cooking sustainable fish is more forgiving than people expect. A\u010b\u010bola and tumbrell both take well to a hot grill or pan, best kept simple with olive oil, herbs, and a squeeze of lemon. Sawrell shines lightly floured and shallow-fried until the skin crisps, or roasted whole with garlic and parsley. \u010ainturin wants a gentler hand sliced into fillets and pan-fried in butter, or lightly breaded while kubrit comes into its own simmered slowly in a traditional tomato sauce with capers and olives, spooned over pasta or torn bread. None of these sustainable fish demand special equipment or a trip to a specialty store; they just ask for a slightly different order at the fish counter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you’re new to cooking whole fish, start simple. A whole sawrell or \u010binturin baked with olive oil, garlic, and a squeeze of lemon needs very little else to taste good, and gives you a low-pressure way to get familiar with handling sustainable fish beyond a pre-cut fillet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How to Support Sustainable Maltese Fish<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Making the switch to sustainable fish doesn’t take a big lifestyle change just a few small habits repeated often enough. Ask your fishmonger for these sustainable fish by name rather than defaulting to “fish,” since specific requests are what shape what gets stocked. Don’t be put off by unfamiliar shapes or skins; any fishmonger will happily gut, scale, or fillet on the spot. And when you do cook sustainable fish at home, share it photo of a home-cooked kubrit stew or a grilled a\u010b\u010bola steak does more to normalise these species than any campaign poster ever could.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

None of this asks you to give anything up. It just asks you to look a little further along the counter, because sustainable fish some of the best, freshest catches around have been there the whole time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n

\n\n\t\t\n
    \n\t\t\t <\/ul>\n <\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Sustainable Fish: 5 Catches Worth Discovering, that’s the idea behind rethinking what lands on your plate. Ask most people what fish they’re having for dinner, and you’ll hear the same few answers on repeat: salmon, sea bream, sea bass. Meanwhile, a handful of sustainable fish pulled straight from our own coastline sit largely ignored, despite being fresher, more affordable, and far easier on the marine environment. This is the gap the Explore the Variety, Eat Sustainable Fish campaign is trying to close. It’s a simple idea: the more we diversify what we eat, the less pressure we put on any single stock, and the more we support the people who fish these waters for a living. It’s worth asking why this happens in the first place. Decades of supermarket habits and imported staples have trained us to associate “good fish” with a very short list of names, most of which aren’t even native to our waters. Salmon is farmed thousands of kilometres away. Sea bream and sea bass, while present locally, are also heavily farmed and imported at scale to meet demand. None of this makes them bad choices outright, but leaning on the same few species year-round concentrates fishing and farming pressure in ways that our own local stocks simply don’t need to face. Choosing sustainable fish instead offers a wider, healthier alternative one that’s been available all along, just overshadowed by habit. Meet the Sustainable Core Five Start with a\u010b\u010bola, the greater amberjack; a powerful predator with dense, meaty flesh closer in texture to steak than to typical white fish, making it a natural swap for swordfish on the grill and one of the standout sustainable fish on this list. Then there’s sawrell, the humble horse mackerel, small and fast-breeding and found in huge numbers along our coast; fish like this can handle steady fishing far better than slower-growing predators, which makes eating more of them one of the simplest ways to eat sustainable fish. \u010ainturin, the scabbardfish, gets overlooked purely because of its shape; long, flat, and silver, like a ribbon of metal but once filleted it’s one of the most delicate white fish around, closer to sole than anything intimidating. Tumbrell, a compact relative of Bluefin tuna, delivers all the deep, savory flavor people love about tuna without the sustainability concerns, since it reproduces quickly and stays abundant. And kubrit, or little tunny, is easy to spot by the dark markings along its back; it thrives in warm coastal waters and grows fast, keeping it reliably available and another easy entry point into sustainable fish. What ties these five sustainable fish together isn’t just where they’re caught, but how well their populations can handle being eaten. Fast-growing, abundant, or lower on the food chain, each one offers a way to enjoy good seafood without adding strain to species that are already under pressure elsewhere. They’re also, in most cases, considerably cheaper than the imported staples they can replace a rare case where the more sustainable fish option is also the better value. Getting Them From Counter to Plate Cooking sustainable fish is more forgiving than people expect. A\u010b\u010bola and tumbrell both take well to a hot grill or pan, best kept simple with olive oil, herbs, and a squeeze of lemon. Sawrell shines lightly floured and shallow-fried until the skin crisps, or roasted whole with garlic and parsley. \u010ainturin wants a gentler hand sliced into fillets and pan-fried in butter, or lightly breaded while kubrit comes into its own simmered slowly in a traditional tomato sauce with capers and olives, spooned over pasta or torn bread. None of these sustainable fish demand special equipment or a trip to a specialty store; they just ask for a slightly different order at the fish counter. If you’re new to cooking whole fish, start simple. A whole sawrell or \u010binturin baked with olive oil, garlic, and a squeeze of lemon needs very little else to taste good, and gives you a low-pressure way to get familiar with handling sustainable fish beyond a pre-cut fillet. How to Support Sustainable Maltese Fish Making the switch to sustainable fish doesn’t take a big lifestyle change just a few small habits repeated often enough. Ask your fishmonger for these sustainable fish by name rather than defaulting to “fish,” since specific requests are what shape what gets stocked. Don’t be put off by unfamiliar shapes or skins; any fishmonger will happily gut, scale, or fillet on the spot. And when you do cook sustainable fish at home, share it photo of a home-cooked kubrit stew or a grilled a\u010b\u010bola steak does more to normalise these species than any campaign poster ever could. None of this asks you to give anything up. It just asks you to look a little further along the counter, because sustainable fish some of the best, freshest catches around have been there the whole time.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6191,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"postBodyCss":"","postBodyMargin":[],"postBodyPadding":[],"postBodyBackground":{"backgroundType":"classic","gradient":""},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[65,63,64],"class_list":["post-6156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","tag-local-fish-malta","tag-sustainable-maltese-fish","tag-sustainable-seafood-malta"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6156"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6156\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6195,"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6156\/revisions\/6195"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explorefishvariety.gov.mt\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}