The Bottarga Whisperers: Living by the mullets
"Take a seat at the stern," instructs Antonis, gesturing for silence. "We mustn't scare them."
By "them," he refers to the female grey mullets, locally known as Bhafhes (Μπάφες). It is “them” we’re after, or rather the roe pouch they carry in their belly, soon to be cured into the renowned Messolonghi Bottarga, a.k.a Avgotaraho (αυγοτάραχο) in Greek. He swiftly jumps onto the slender boat, grabbing a pole to steady it. I follow suit, camera in hand.
Calmy, we navigate the lagoon's mirror-like surface, our little blue boat scarcely disturbing the waters. As the dawn's blue hues turn to orange, we approach one of the "pyres" (πύρες), the spiral cages trapping fish as they follow the gentle local tides. I can barely see below the shallow, crystal clear water, but Antonis’ trained eye has already identified 4-5 bhafhes swimming in the trap. "Welcome, ladies," he smirks, grabbing a hand net to pull them aboard and into a red bucket, alongside some smaller fish.
We glide to the next pyres, yet Antonis is not happy with quantities and sizes. "Perhaps it's still a little early in August," he tells me. "Give them time, and they'll come. September will be better." September is the major bottarga season.
Gradually, he steers the boat back to the shack—a simple home and boat house where he spends his working time all year round, in shifts.
Later in the day, as twilight descends, I meet Manos and Giorgos at another fishing facility near an inlet by the open sea. Like Antonis, they work in the family-run fish business, but instead of traps, those two use nets to catch the fish in these parts of the lagoon.
Aboard their slightly longer but also very narrow boat ( again blue), we head out to a distant part of the lagoon, where they throw the nets into the water in a huge circle and leave them there until about midnight.
Against the backdrop of fading light and the lagoon's Dalmatian pelicans flying homeward, Giorgos tells me of an era when nets were prohibited, a time when the fish population thrived, and traps alone sufficed to fulfil bottarga quotas.
Unfortunately, poor lagoon maintenance, climate change, and over-fertilization of the groundwater have severely reduced fish numbers, so nets were introduced to allow for fishing in distant areas of the lagoon where pyres couldn’t be maintained.
We meet again the next morning at their bottarga prep workshop. With surgical precision, Giorgos extracts the roe pouch from a 40 cm mullet, trims it, and preps the remaining fish for the Messolonghi town market (bhafhes, incidentally, are excellent for grilling and roasting). He immerses the ochre-hued roe in salt for drying and curing, carefully recording details and timings for each fish processed.
Moving to the next, smaller room, I see the already cured, bright orange bottarga left to air-dry. Giorgos, ceremoniously, begins the beeswax-covering ritual. Three thin layers of natural wax, that’s the way to do it. While still soft at this stage, the bottarga will gradually harden by the time it hits the shelves. A lucky few will have the pleasure to taste the unwaxed soft bottarga. A privilege of the locals and certain photographers.
Greek bottarga fans savour thin slices of it alongside ouzo, wine or tsipouro, meze style. Across the Ionian Sea, Italians grate Sardinian bottarga onto their spaghetti. I tell that to Giorgos whose family has been running the business for years. Lunatics, he shouts and laughs!
The story was shot in the summer of 2019. This post was published in August 2023
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