Lenten Fish Fry Ratings & Reviews

I have been to several Lenten fish fries at Catholic parishes, most in the Kansas City area. I found one (St. Agnes parish, Shawnee Mission, Kansas) that served excellent cornmeal breaded catfish. In the St. Louis area there is a parish (St. John’s parish, Smithton, Illinois) that serves a crisp cornmeal breaded cod using locally-famous Snuffy’s recipe that is worth a trip to Smithton. I am now on a quest to find delicious fish like these being served at Catholic parishes in the Denver area.

Friday, February 29, 2008

St. Mark's Catholic Church

February 15, 2008

Friday "Knight" Fish Fry

St Mark Church Parish Center

3141 West 96th Avenue, Westminster, CO 80031
Cost: $7.00/adult, $9.00 "Super Serving", $3.00/child 10 and under,
children 3 and under eat free

Fridays of Lent Feb. 8th - Mar. 14th, 5:00 - 7:00 p.m.
http://www.saintmarkcc.org/

This fish fry was about average for a Denver-area Lenten fry. They offered fried fish, french fies, potato salad, dinner salad, fruit salad, and a dinner roll. Their website also says they serve potato-battered baked fish, but I must have gotten there too late to try that because I didn't see that at all. To drink they served tea, coffee, fruit punch and water.

The Knights of Columbus serving up the food and drinks were very friendly, putting my drink in my cup for me and even offering to bring it to the table for me if I couldn't carry everything. How nice! The fried fish was battered and pefectly fried. It had a very nice flavor and was moist but not under-cooked at all. The french fries were thick cut and sprinkled with seasoned salt. They were a bit on the potato-y side for me, but I'm not a big fan of tubers so I am biased. My dinner companion went back for thirds on fish AND fries however, so there you go. There was apparently a choice of dinner salad: Caesar was one but there was another option that another diner was eagerly awaiting at the serving table. The Caesar salad was just the kind from a bag though, so I'm thinking the other one was too; I didn't wait to find out. It was nothing special. They offered a variety of dressings and I dutifully took the "Caesar" dressing that matched the lettuce on my plate. The potato salad had mustard and egg in it which I like, but despite that it didn't have a lot of flavor and was was probably store-bought. The fruit salad was canned and mushy. I liked that it had mango in it, but is mango so good that it can make a bad fruit salad good? No! Such is mango!

I noted above that a "super serving" is available for two dollars extra. I should point out that although my dinner companion went back for extra servings, he was not asked to pay for a "Super Serving" and we weren't even offered that as an option when we paid; that is something mentioned on the website.

The drinks offered were the standard offering, but missing were the beer and wine options usually available for a small extra fee or donation. Also missing from this fish fry was a bake sale. No dessert at all!

I give this Lenten fish fry two out of five Ichthus.