31 Jul /14

Scampi

Scampi (plural) – scampo (singular)

Scampi was a familiar catch in the Mediterranean. G L Faber, the British consul in Fiume was fascinated about fish and wrote various different works on the subject including The Fisheries of the Adriatic and the Fish Thereof in 1883. It is in this work that the term scampi was first introduced to English speaking readers.  Faber writes: “The famous scampo is caught off the Hungarian coast [and] the Italians catch scampi better on moonlit nights.”  Only a couple of years after its introduction to the English language, and another British official, the delightfully named Lieut. Col. Sir R. Lambert Playfair waxed enthusiastically in his Handbook of the Mediterranean: Its Cities, Coasts and Islands (1890) about the so-called “Scampo (Nephrops Norvegicus), a delicious kind of crayfish, from 4 to 8 in. in length. It is found in the deeper parts of the Quarnero, where fresh-water springs abound, but is not met with elsewhere in the Adriatic. It is caught by the Italian trawling-boats, bragozzi, which fish off these shores in winter.”

British diplomats had the leading edge here. Once the habitat and appearance of the maritime creature was defined scampi enthusiasts directed their attention to the proper storage and preparation of the increasingly popular delicacy. With scampi, freshness has always been an issue. In 1928, marine biologists Russell and Yonge pointed out that “Dublin prawns”, as scampi were otherwise known had to be brought to market quickly and always cooked fresh.

It was Evelyn Waugh who is credited with being the first writer to describe the pleasure of eating them. Yes, in Italy in the Venetian restaurant Cavalletto, where he “felt no ill effects” after eating scampi, fresh ones we can safely assume.

Until the 1950s scampi remained a delicacy reserved for sea towns and coastal areas. But with the onset of industrial refrigeration, scampi made their way onto the plates of families all over the world where they have remained ever since.