In search of fish !

In my head in culinary heaven there will be four clouds. And on each cloud their will be something to do with food and drink.
As you know my fruit and vegetable heavenly cloud will be stocked by The Meldon Kitchen Garden, Mitford, near Morpeth by my mate Emily.
The others are not as clear cut. I do have a butchers in mind for one cloud and more about that in the coming weeks. I would have to have a cloud where Alcohol would be available and at the moment its got to be supplied by Moet because of all the money I am earning freelancing ! Ha ha ! (just a joke Kelvin !)
The other cloud would have to be a fishmongers. I have searched high and low for a good fish supplier near Ashington but to no avail. So today I travelled to North Shields for a look around the fish quay.
In its day I can only imagine how busy it must have been. However the sands of time have eroded its economy and the livelihood it must have provided for the community.
I was surprised to see a lot of bars and restaurants where I had expected so see all things sea faring.
Yes there were some fish and chip shops but I could not get over the Italian restaurant and what I would describe as the many "Dude" bars ! I am not saying for one moment they are bad its just I was a little surprised.
Anyway their were some great fish suppliers down there including the two main suppliers to the local  restaurant, pub and hotel industry. Frank Rounds and Taylor's. I didn't bother with them on this occasion as I am familiar with the standard of their fish and was looking for something new.
I will say that one of the delivery drivers for one of those two companies I just mentioned (I won't say which one) is an old boy who I have only seen twice in 7 years. Once back in 2005 and just the other day at the Treehouse. He looks a real character. During the war while Uncle Albert was getting sunk by every other ship he came across this old boy must have been trained by the Special Forces in sneakiness because I swear the number of times I have been working away in the kitchen only to look behind me and see a delivery of fish appear from seemly no where is too many to mention. No matter how quickly I amble to the deliveries door and try to see him he is no where to be seen. He could be the ghostly spirit of an old delivery driver who still haunts his old round but that would just be me being silly ! ha ha !

So after a little walk I settled upon this little mecca of a fishmongers. Talk about a kid in a sweet shop. It was great to see a fish display that had more than some crab sticks, a piece of peppercorn encrusted smoked mackerel and some tiny prawns for a fiver on it.

What a wonderful selection of fresh fish they had. The only problem was having to freeze most of it. This slightly goes against the grain as fish that is fresh is at its best.

I could not fit all this into my car but I shall return ....O yes one day it will all be mine !

Their was a blackboard with where some of the fish came from. Ok I am turning into a train spotter !

The place shook when their huge "Billy the Bass" started doing covers of Barry White numbers ! Hats of to him that fish has got talent ! ha ha !

I was not only one looking for fish !

So on number 2 cloud will go Seaview fisheries. Its not quite a stones throw away from my front door but I guess I will just have to practice throwing further.