Sea bream substitutes

Not so much a substitute as the same fish - porgy is a sea bream, sold cheaply on the US East Coast.

Best for

roasting whole, grilling, steaming whole with ginger and scallion, pan-frying

Sweet, firm, fine-flaked and around the same ¾ to 1.5 lb per fish, so timing and portioning carry across unchanged. Porgy has more small bones than gilt-head bream and slightly thinner flesh, so it is a little more work at the table, and it is usually a fraction of the price. Score the sides twice on each flank and roast at 425F (220C) for 18-22 minutes.

The most available whole Mediterranean fish, and near enough that most diners would not notice the change.

Best for

roasting whole, salt-baked fish, grilling, en papillote, Mediterranean and Turkish recipes

Slightly more delicate and a shade less sweet than gilt-head bream, with skin that crisps just as well. It is farmed widely, so it is reliable and reasonably priced, and it comes in the same one-fish-per-person size. Cooking times are the same. If anything the flesh is softer, so lift it out of the pan or off the grill with two spatulas rather than one.

Firmer and more assertive, and the best option if you want a single centrepiece fish for a table.

Best for

roasting whole, grilling, Caribbean and Southeast Asian recipes, fillets

Snapper is a bigger fish, so buy one instead of several and add time: a 3 lb whole snapper wants 30-40 minutes at 425F (220C) rather than 20. The flavour is noticeably fuller and slightly nutty, so a very simple treatment of lemon, oil and herbs tastes richer than it would with bream. The skin is tougher, which makes it excellent on a grill.

Sweet, firm and clean-tasting - arguably better than bream, and equally good whole or filleted.

Best for

steaming whole, roasting, grilling, crisp-skin fillets, sashimi-style dishes

Black sea bass is the standard swap for Japanese tai and for whole steamed Chinese-style fish, because the flesh is firm, white and just as sweet. Striped bass is meatier and comes in larger fish, so buy one and portion it. Both cost more than bream in most markets. Neither carries any muddiness, which is the risk with cheaper whole fish.

Right size, right shape, right skin-on whole-fish handling - but a distinctly richer, unmistakably trout flavour.

Best for

roasting whole, grilling whole, stuffed with herbs and lemon, en papillote

Trout is fattier than bream, so it stays moist and is very hard to ruin, and it is cheap and available almost everywhere. What changes is flavour: the flesh is pinkish and tastes clearly of trout rather than of clean sweet sea fish, which suits a herb-and-butter treatment and slightly fights a Mediterranean one with olives and capers. Same cooking time as a 1 lb bream.

The cheapest whole fish in most supermarkets and the weakest of these swaps - softer, blander and with skin that never really crisps.

Best for

steamed whole fish with ginger and scallion, fried whole fish with a strong sauce, curries

It gives you the shape of the dish and not much of the pleasure. The flesh is looser than bream and can taste faintly earthy, and the skin goes leathery rather than crisp. It works best steamed with plenty of ginger, scallion and soy, or deep-fried whole and drenched in a sharp sauce, where the aromatics lead. For a simple salt-baked or plainly roasted fish, buy branzino instead.

For the recipes that call for bream fillets rather than the whole fish.

Best for

crisp-skin pan-fried fillets, roasting fillets, ceviche and crudo, en papillote

Snapper, black bass and barramundi fillets all pan-fry skin-side-down the way bream does: dry the skin, press it flat for the first 30 seconds, and give it 3-4 minutes before turning. Snapper skin is thicker and crisps hardest; bass is milder and closer to bream in flavour. If the dish is raw - crudo, carpaccio or a sashimi-style plate - buy only fish your fishmonger sells specifically for raw consumption.