Buying Gulf Seafood in Naples

If you have a rental with a kitchen, the single best-value meal in Naples is one you cook. The local counters get Gulf fish daily, and the difference between that and a supermarket fillet is not subtle.

What is actually local

• Grouper — red and black, year-round with seasonal closures
• Yellowtail and mangrove snapper
• Hogfish — a southwest Florida speciality
• Pink shrimp from the Gulf fleet
• Stone crab claws, mid-October to mid-May
• Mullet, in winter, and worth trying smoked

What is not local, whatever the sign implies: salmon, tuna in most cases, cod, tilapia, and any 'jumbo' shrimp at a suspicious price.

How to buy well

• Ask what came in today. A good counter answers immediately and specifically.
• Ask fresh or previously frozen. Both are legitimate; being told the truth is the test.
• Buy whole where you can. It keeps better, costs less per pound of edible fish, and the eyes tell you the truth about freshness.
• Smell it. Fresh Gulf fish smells of clean sea water and nothing else.

Cooking it simply

Grouper: floured and pan-fried in butter with lemon, four minutes a side. Snapper: whole, scored, roasted at 220°C for 18 minutes with lime and garlic. Stone crab: already cooked when you buy it — chill it, crack it, mustard sauce, do nothing else to it. Any attempt to improve a stone crab claw is a mistake.