With the sydney fish market doing their annual 36 hours non stop shop, I was curious to know how they compete in price compared to Woolworths and Coles?
Lets say
- King crab
- Prawns
- Snapper
to remove the piece of string from the equation. I'm not as fussed in regards to the freshness, as I'm skeptical that they went and caught extra fish yesterday when its probably that week's or last week's work.
Also are ozbargainers, like seagulls waiting until 4:45pm on Christmas eve to snap up the bargains (or does it just go back in the freezer)?
We visit the fish market about once a month, as we've found that the local fish shops just do not compare in terms of freshness for sashimi-grade fish. The fish market is not cheaper, and is sometimes more expensive but the quality and variety is great, especially at Claudios.
But for the Christmas period, we avoid it like the plague. The prices there go up significantly - prawns are above $23-$30/kg. We're usually going for raw prawns to be used for cooking at Christmas time, and Woolworths is selling boxes of 5kg frozen banana prawns or 10kg frozen king prawns for $16.99/kg. These are frozen on ship after being caught and very fresh - don't go for the ones that are already sitting there on display that may have already been thawed for a long time. As I type this I have about 3kgs defrosting away in preparation for tomorrow's lunch. I've been buying these and the quality is simlar to the fish market if you ask woolies for the frozen ones straight from the box that have never ever been thawed.
Edit: You don't have to buy whole boxes - just ask them nicely for the ones that are still frozen and they might be happy to get some from the freezer for you.
As for fish, if you're not eating it raw, local fish shops with a high turnover will be fine.
Edit: Sorry I have no idea about king crab, haven't bought that before.