Welcome to the summary page for FabulousFusionFood's Cook's Guide entry for Carp along with all the Carp containing recipes presented on this site, with 35 recipes in total.

This is a continuation of an entire series of pages that will, I hope, allow my visitors to better navigate this site. As well as displaying recipes by name, country and region of origin I am now planning a whole series of pages where recipes can be located by meal type and main ingredient. This page gives a listing of all the Carp recipes added to this site.

These recipes, all contain Carp as a major wild food ingredient.



Carp. Carp represents a family of oily freshwater fish in the family Cyprinidae, a very large group of fish native to Europe and Asia. Most cypriniformes have scales and teeth on the inferior pharyngeal bones which may be modified in relation to the diet. They are also characterized by being found predominantly in fresh water and that they possess Weberian ossicles (an anatomical structure originally made up of small pieces of bone formed from four or five of the first vertebrae); the most anterior bony pair is in contact with the extension of the labyrinth and the posterior with the swimbladder. It is believed that these structures aid in the transmission of sounds from the swimbladder, explaining why carp have such a great capacity for hearing.

Scientifically, many consider all cyprinid fishes carp, and the family Cyprinidae itself is often known as the carp family. In colloquial use, however, carp usually refers only to several larger cyprinid species such as Cyprinus carpio (common carp), Carassius carassius (Crucian carp), Ctenopharyngodon idella (grass carp), Hypophthalmichthys molitrix (silver carp), and Hypophthalmichthys nobilis (bighead carp). Because they lend themselves easily to aquaculture and can be farmed in pools, carp have long been an important food fish to humans. Indeed, various species of carp have been domesticated and reared as food fish across Europe and Asia for thousands of years. These various species appear to have been domesticated independently, as the various domesticated carp species are native to different parts of Eurasia. Aquaculture has been pursued in China for at least 2,400 years. Though aquaculture of carp has declined in Western Europe (mostly doe to the availability of more desirable species such as salmon and trout) fish production in ponds is still a major form of aquaculture in Central and Eastern Europe, including the Russian Federation, where most of the production comes from low or intermediate-intensity ponds.

Though the common carp, as its name suggests is the most common species, it is not highly valued as food, and many consider that it tastes 'muddy', though it is esteemed in parts of China as the flesh is dark and richer in flavour than many other carp species. One of the main problems with this fish are its intramuscular bones which are hard to deal with and make it difficult to produce 'boneless' fillets. Bighead carp is enjoyed in many parts of the world as its flesh is white, firm and milder in taste than the common carp. They also share the intramuscular bone problem of common carp, though wild-caught specimens tend to be larger and the bones are easier to deal with. Crucian carp is considered the best-tasting pan fish in Poland. It is known as karaś and is traditionally served with sour cream (karasie w śmietanie). In Russia it is the Golden Crucian that is most esteemed, particularly for cooking in soups. Mud carp: due to the low cost of production, the fish is mainly consumed by the poor and locally consumed; it is mostly sold and eaten live, but can be dried and salted. The fish is sometimes canned or processed as fish cakes, fish balls or dumplings. They can be found for retail sale within China. In the late 1990s, scientists at the Chinese Academy of Fishery Sciences developed a new variant of the common carp called the Jian carp. This succulent fish grows rapidly and has a high feed conversion rate. Over 50% of the total aquaculture production of carp in China has now converted to Jian carp. The image shown here compares a fillet of common carp (left) with a fillet of glass carp (right). The flesh of the bighead carp is much more similar to that of the glass carp. The fish shown is a common carp from Thailand.

During the European Middle Ages, carp aquaculture was a very important part of the European economy and the majority of monasteries had their own carp ponds or pools. This was to ensure a steady supply of fish to be eaten on the 'meatless' or 'fast' days of the Christian calendar (at one point there were more meatless days than there were days when meat could be eaten). The main types of carp grown were the common, mirror, crucian and grass carp.