When a Salmon is a Trout

Last summer, we ate a meal in the Eiffel Tower and I was (privately) indignant when my "trout" came back looking just like the salmon I cook every week at home.  I mean, c'mon, I want something other than home-cooking when I'm eating in Paris, people!  My mind went right to "tourist trap" and I grumbled a bit about it to Irene and I allowed it to mar what was otherwise a lovely lunch.

Fast forward to last week when Irene did the Costco run and (for the first time) bought the weekly salmon.  She told me she bought the slightly more expensive one because the cheapest one was labelled "steelhead" and not explicitly "salmon" so, in the doubt, she bought the one labelled salmon. I get on my righteous high horse and tell her I always buy the cheapest one and I suppose I had noticed the labels were different, but ,whatever, ... they are all types of salmon....

... or are they?

Steelhead Trout

Salmon (king/chinook)

What What?  Turns out my trusty old "steelhead" IS a trout so the Eiffel Tower place was not misleading me - they were just calling it like it is  ("truite saumonee")   The steelhead is a subspecies of trout that goes out into the ocean and then lives & eats similarly to a salmon (and therefore looks and tastes similar).

Apparently there is much confusion on the subject of where the dividing line is between these critters so at least I am not alone in my confusion.  Understandable confusion; people want things to stay within their well-defined lanes and boxes when nature really operates on a continuum.  

In France, you can order a trout and get what looks like a salmon while in America you might buy a salmon that turns out to be a trout.  Either way, identifying fish has made me a fool twice over and I don't need any help in that department!