In old times, the eel was often said to be the snake's brother. Few animals are as surrounded by myths as this slender fish. Is it true that it can wind itself over wet grass on land? Is it really poisonous? What is it doing in the wide Sargasso Sea? Where does it originally come from and where do the eel larvae go, the ones that are to become fully grown, fat eels?

If you want to really get to know the eel, there are allegedly three things you must do, just like in the saga. The first of these things is coming along on an eel fishing trip. The second is participating at a traditional eel feast, including wormwood schnapps and seven different eel dishes. The third is listening to all the wild stories about eels that are being told in the region. I have done all of the above, and I can also pride myself on having grabbed a fat eel by its tail, making me a true eel connoisseur.

On a quiet August morning, I accompanied a fisherman named Ola to Hanöbukten, the Hanö Bay. Ola's father, who in turn had been taught by his father, taught Ola all he knows about fishing. Today he hires fishing facilities from Count Piper of the Castle of Christinehof. The enormous trapnets used for catching the eels are placed right outside the harbour in the little village of Kivik. The first of Ola's nets is laid out in the beginning of August, the second a few weeks after that and the last ones at the end of the month. The fishing season stretches as far as the end of November, but most of the catches are made in October. The trapnets are about 1000 feet wide and look like enormous funnels. They are brought out to sea by giant barges, and a lot of knowledge is required to lay them out correctly.

No other fish leads such an exciting, travelling life as the eel. The larvae, called leptocephalus, that get carried into Öresund (also known as the Sound – the strait separating Sweden from Denmark) by the streams instinctively look for freshwater. They find their way into streams and watercourses where they will spend their youth as a so called yellow eels for at least eight, and up to 20 years. It is true that they are now able to wind themselves over wet grass from one stretch of water to another. It is also true that eels are not yet sexed at this point. If the eel population is endangered, most eels will, as a survival mechanism, develop into females.

Then, one day, the time has come for the eels to travel back to the Sargasso Sea to spawn and reproduce. At this point in life, the appearance of the eel changes. It turns black, shiny and fat, and is now often referred to as silver eel. The eel's anus closes up and from now on, the eel has to rely on its fat reserves, since it doesn't eat anything during the whole journey. It goes without saying that a lot of eating is required beforehand – it takes energy to swim 4000 miles! The eels always start their journey in late summer or early autumn, and a large amount of Sweden's, as well as Finland's, eels will be found swimming along the shores of Skåne at this time of year. Some will inevitabely swim off track and into the trapnets, ending up at the eel feasts.

Unfortunately, the eels are rather threatened these days, not so much due to the fishing but because of various environmental problems. Unless the conditions change to the better within the near future, there is a risk that eel fishing in Sweden will be prohibited. Eel larvae are today being planted with the hope of securing the eel population. Let us hope that this goes according to plan – otherwise the strange, yet somehow magical eel feasts will be but a memory.

A traditional eel feast should include seven different eel dishes, such as grilled eel, poached cold eel, baked eel, smoked eel and ”straw eel” – another grilled version – eel soup and eel in aspic. There is a terrible story about what a real eel feast should be like, told by an eye witness named Orvar Nilsson: ”A real eel feast is when a bunch of men enter a shed at dusk to eat eel, and come out at dawn, and nobody knows what happened in there, not even the ones who were there.”

In the old days, one person would always be crowned ”eel king” or ”eel queen” at an eel feast. The procedure was for the participants to stick their hand into a large barrel of water, in which a fat, black eel was swimming. The challenge was to grab the eel and hold on to it without losing your grip, which is not an easy task since the eel is, literally, slippery as an eel. The best way to do it is to grab it by its tail – the fish will then throw its head upwards and the rest of the body freezes as if paralyzed.

It is fun to have something important to discuss during an eel feast, whether it is one of the old-fashioned kind, with seven various types of eel, or a modern gourmet eel menue – or perhaps just a piece of traditional dark rye bread topped with smoked eel. What, then, might be better to talk about than the occasion's center of attention – the eel itself! Sometimes it is difficult to keep myths and facts apart. It is actually true that eel's blood is poisonous. The rumour says that if blood from an eel gets into the open wound of a small dog, or at least a guinea pig, it can die within hours. When this story is told, people cringe and almost choke on their eel bones, but you can comfort the person next to you with the fact that the poison, called ichtyotoxin, is quickly neutralized in the digestion system of humans. It doesn't hurt, however, to protect your eyes while gutting the eel.

Last time I participated at an eel feast in a small cottage situated along the wild eel coast south of Århus, I ambitiously tried to take notes of observations and impressions during the evening. My notes start off with quiet observations of the surroundings – the silhouettes of the pine trees, the geese in the sky – but as the evening goes by and the schnapps drinking escalates, it becomes increasingly hard to interpret the notes. The bearded host of the evening sang songs and told incredible stories while serving one eel dish after another and pouring liquor from the bottle. I wrote that the liquor is necessary to neutralize all the the fat, and everybody who has participated at an eel feast knows that this is true. Other claims may be more dubious, for instance that the effects of the alcohol are delayed because of the fat so that you will not feel the intoxication until morning; that eel skin is the most effective aphrodisiac in the world; or that when eating eel, you are using so much energy to digest the fat that it will actually make you lose weight. I feverishly wrote down all these crazy stories and nonsense with the grease dripping from my fingers, while happily singing along with the rest. I remember waking up in the pale aftermath of the evening thinking ”never again”… but that is a year ago now.

Sanna Töringe is a librarian, writer and journalist living in Österlen, in the south-eastern part of Skåne. She has written around ten books about gardening and food.

Translation by Lina Weilemar