Why are Bloaters no longer available at Fishmongers whereas Kippers are?!
Answers:
It's down to shelf life. Kippers keep for weeks. Bloaters go off after a couple of days.
In the days before refrigerators, and when fish on Friday was the norm, fishmongers would get bloaters delivered on a Friday morning and sell them all by lunchtime. Now we like to get our shopping in once a week, it simply wouldn't work. If you'd like to go up to the Suffolk coast, you can still get bloaters, but you need to eat them the same day.
Kippers are smoked herrings, split down the middle - bloaters are a different specie of fish, and maybe have been fished out or are now not popular enough for fishmongers to stock.
We use those for bait.
