Rigby’s Encyclopaedia of the Herring

aka The Herripedia

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Rigby's Encyclopaedia of the Herring

AND NOW THE BOOK!

Rigby’s Encyclopaedia of the Herring

Adventures with the King of Fishes

Out September 25th 2025, hardback, published by Hurst, 450pp + 32 colour, a snip at £25. Preorder online or from your local independent bookshop. Based on the blog entries here and plenty more besides, rewritten, corrected and developed, it’s the book you know you’ve always wanted!

ONLINE ENCYCLOPAEDIA

Accessible alphabetically and by theme – history, science, culture, fishing and food.

Suggestions and corrections always welcome.

PODCASTS

Drawing on the encyclopaedia and exploring beginnings, sovereignty and sardines, fasting and fisher lasses.

All Podcasts…

Recently Added

A-Z Entries

GOLDEN HERRING

On the golden coloured, more lightly smoked version of red herring, once sold extensively in the Mediterranean, together with recipes

GRANDMOTHER’S RECIPES

The self-indulgent inclusion of two herring dishes appearing in my Sussex grandmother's hand-written collection of strangely intermingled poems and recipes

GREEN HERRING

A very short entry explaining what green herring is, together with a visual explanation of why the silver darlings may have acquired that name

HARENG SAUR

A French-speaking smoked herring of Normandy and Belgium, le hareng saur can mean red herring, bloater (le bouffi) and kipper (le kipper)

HARENG SAUR MONOLOGUES

The hareng saur of the Siege of Paris inspired poems by Cros, Huysmans and Richepin and, with them, the modern French monologue

HERRING BHURTA

Cross-cultural creation or adaptation of some genuine Indian recipe to the fish available to returning ex-pats? A dish from Harvey Day.

HERRING BUSS (TUNE)

A jig from 1750, The Herring Buss, is found and played for you by the excellent English concertina player Rob Harbron

HERRING INDUSTRY BOARD

A child of Ramsay MacDonald’s National Government, the Herring Industry Board was shaped by his Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries the Scottish Unionist Walter Elliot,... Read More

HERRING LASSES

On the herring lasses and the work they did, following the fishing around the coast of Britain, but particularly from Shetland to Great Yarmouth

HERRING UNDER A FUR COAT

Various recipes explored for this classic Russian dish, together with a photograph of one I made earlier

HERRING’S HEAD

On the traditional song, collected across the British Isles, celebrating the ways the herring underpins everything of social importance

ICELANDIC FISHERY

A brief history of the brief history of The Herring Adventure, in which our hero transforms an economy and emancipates womankind
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