Śledź: Polish herring, the ways it comes, what to order and what to avoid

Overview

Śledź is herring, and in Poland it almost never means a fish eaten fresh off the boat. It means herring that has been salted first and then dressed: in oil, in vinegar, in soured cream, under a heap of onion. It is cold, sharp and fatty. It is the national zakąska, the small plate that sits beside a glass of vodka. Bread or a boiled potato usually comes with it.

It is not Gdańsk’s alone. It is eaten the length of the country, and inland cities take it just as seriously. The claim of this city is older and broader than any one recipe. Gdańsk was a member of the Hanseatic League, and salted herring was one of the staples that trade network moved around the Baltic. A city built on grain, timber and preserved fish has a better claim to herring than most. What the city does not have is a protected designation or a recipe of its own, so treat any menu line calling something “Gdańsk herring” as a description, not a standard.

The nearest thing to a local style comes from just outside. Kashubia, the lake-and-hill country west and south-west of the city, gives its name to śledź po kaszubsku. If you see it on a menu, it is the version most worth ordering here, because it is the one with a genuine regional address.

One honest point about the fish itself: much of the salted herring sold in Poland comes from the North Atlantic, not the Baltic. Baltic herring is smaller and leaner. Where it is used, it tends to turn up whole, smoked or fried, rather than as the thick pale fillet in a bowl of oil. Neither is a fraud. They are simply different fish.

What to order

The noun changes with the grammar. You ask for śledzia (“poproszę śledzia”), and a plate of several is śledzie. The diminutive śledzik is affectionate and is what you will hear at the table.

• śledź w oleju — fillet pieces in neutral oil with raw onion, sometimes with a little allspice or pepper. It is the baseline, and the best test of the fish, because nothing hides it.
• śledź w śmietanie — in soured cream with onion, very often with grated or diced apple and sometimes a pickled cucumber. It should be tart, not sweet. This is the gentlest way in for anyone unsure about salted fish.
• śledź po kaszubsku — the regional one. Herring in a cooked sauce of onion softened in oil with tomato concentrate and vinegar. Some versions add prunes, a bay leaf or allspice. It should taste rich and sour-sweet, with the onion soft rather than raw.
• rolmops (plural rolmopsy) — a fillet marinated in vinegar and rolled around onion and gherkin, held with a wooden pick. It is sharper and firmer than the oil versions.
• matjas — from the Dutch word for young, fatty herring cured before it spawns. Polish shops use the word loosely for a mild, soft salted fillet. It is good, but do not assume the Dutch definition applies.
• śledź po japońsku — “Japanese-style”: halved hard-boiled eggs topped with herring, mayonnaise and often a few vegetables. Nothing about it is Japanese. Explanations for the name circulate, but none is reliable, and it is best enjoyed as a mystery.
• pod pierzynką — “under a duvet”: layers of herring, potato, beetroot, egg and mayonnaise, cut like a cake. It is party food rather than a bar snack.
• pikling — hot-smoked whole herring, sold on the coast alongside other smoked fish. This is where Baltic fish is most likely what you are eating.

Some restaurants offer a plate of śledzie done three or four ways. That is the efficient order for a first visit, and there is no shame in it.

A harmless way to mark yourself as a visitor is to order herring as a main course and wait for something hot to follow. It is a starter, or a snack with a drink. The exception is śledź z ziemniakami: herring with potatoes boiled or baked in their skins, sometimes with soured cream and dill. That plate is a perfectly respectable lunch.

What to avoid

Most bad herring here is not fake. It is tired. The fault is usually time, sugar or temperature, not substitution.

Look at the edges of the fillet. Good salted herring is firm, pale ivory to gray-pink, and cuts cleanly. Pieces that have gone soft, fibrous or mushy have sat in their marinade far too long. Pieces that are dark and dry at the rim have sat uncovered. A smell should be of brine and onion. A smell of anything sharp or stale is the fish telling you its age.

Sweetness is a common cheat. Cheap marinades and cream sauces lean heavily on sugar to cover a flat fish. A śmietana herring that tastes like dessert, or a kaszubski sauce that is closer to ketchup than to cooked onion and tomato, has been made to a price.

A salt problem is the opposite failure. Salted fillets must be soaked before they are dressed. Herring that is fiercely salty, so that you reach for water rather than for the next bite, was not soaked long enough.

Be wary of herring laid out on an open buffet, the cold platter at a hotel breakfast or a large group dinner. It is a cold dish, and an hour at room temperature does it more harm than a mediocre recipe would.

“Baltic” on a sign by the smoked-fish kiosks is worth asking about: some smoked fish on this coast is local and some is not.

Practicalities

The cheapest herring is usually at a bar mleczny, the old-style milk-bar canteen, where a plate of herring in oil or cream is made in bulk and eaten fast. A sit-down restaurant charges more for a starter or a mixed plate.

Gdańsk, like other Polish cities, has a genre of late-opening vodka-and-snack bars. They charge a flat, low price per small plate and per shot, and herring is the core of the menu. They are cheap, loud and well suited to the dish’s actual social function.

To buy it as Poles do, go to a fish counter, in the Hala Targowa in the Old Town or in any supermarket. Herring is sold there by weight, already dressed, or as salted fillets (płaty) for soaking at home. The fish counter is where you can see and smell what you are getting before you pay.

It is eaten all year, but it has two peaks worth knowing about:

• The last days of carnival. The Tuesday before Ash Wednesday is the night of śledzik: parties that say goodbye to meat with herring and vodka before Lent.
• Wigilia, the meatless supper on Christmas Eve. Herring in at least one form is close to obligatory. In the weeks before, fish counters stock their widest range.

With vodka, the custom is to drink the shot and then eat a piece of herring straight after, not to sip and nibble. Nobody will hold it against a visitor who does otherwise.