- Espada com banana is a fillet of black scabbardfish, usually fried in breadcrumbs, served with fried or caramelised banana. Sometimes with a passion fruit sauce.
- Black scabbardfish lives in the Atlantic at depths from a few hundred to over 2000 metres. Fishermen from Câmara de Lobos catch it at night on long lines with hooks.
- Taste: despite its fearsome looks, the flesh is white, delicate and mild.
- Where to see it: in the morning, in the fish hall of the Mercado dos Lavradores market in Funchal.
- In this guide you’ll also find a recipe for 4.
A fish hauled up at night from more than a kilometre down, with terrifying fangs and huge eyes, served with sweet fried banana. Espada com banana (scabbardfish with banana) is one of Madeira’s best-known dishes. And probably one of its most surprising flavour combinations.
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Black scabbardfish – a monster from the ocean depths
Black scabbardfish, espada in Portuguese, is a fish that looks… as if it escaped from a horror film. Its long black body can grow to more than a metre. The pointed snout, armed with protruding fangs, looks like a weapon, and the huge round eyes – adapted to life in the dark – are almost cartoonish.
I’m glad I tried the famous espada com banana first and only later saw a scabbardfish for the first time at the Mercado dos Lavradores. I suspect that after seeing one I might have had second thoughts about this wonderfully unusual dish.
Black scabbardfish (Aphanopus carbo) lives in the Atlantic, from the Denmark Strait to Cape Verde, at depths from 200 to over 2000 metres, most often 700–1300 m, where sunlight no longer reaches. A popular myth says it’s found only off Madeira and Japan, but that isn’t true. It is, however, in Madeira that it has been fished traditionally for generations, and here that it has become a symbol of the local cuisine (FishBase).
1: Black scabbardfish at the Mercado dos Lavradores, 2: Fishing boats in Câmara de Lobos. Photo: Ewelina Podrez-Siama, 2025, 3: Grilled black scabbardfish with banana – a classic in Câmara de Lobos, where fishing is everyday life, not folklore. Photo: Ewelina Podrez-Siama, February 2026, 4: Fishing boats on the quayside in Câmara de Lobos. Photo: Ewelina Podrez-Siama, March 2025
Night fishing in Câmara de Lobos
Fishermen from the picturesque village of Câmara de Lobos – the same one Winston Churchill liked to paint – head out after dark, when the fish come up a little higher than during the day. They use very long lines with hundreds of hooks (longlines) to bring espada up from the deep. It’s hard, time-consuming work: the fish often has to be hauled up from more than 1000 metres.
You can see the results of this night work every morning at the Mercado dos Lavradores in Funchal. In the fish section, the stalls groan under the weight of shiny black espada laid out on ice.
Why banana?
Fish with banana sounds like a kitchen experiment that got out of hand. And yet in Madeira it’s a tradition.
Espada is the most widely eaten fish in Madeira. In the classic version of espada com banana, the fish is fried in breadcrumbs and served with fried or caramelised banana. Sometimes the dish comes with a passion fruit (maracujá) sauce, which adds a sweet-and-sour note.
What does espada com banana taste like?
Despite its demonic looks, espada has white, delicate, mild flesh – the complete opposite of what its appearance suggests. The fish is usually breaded (flour → egg → breadcrumbs or ground almonds) and fried until golden brown, about 2–3 minutes on each side.
The bananas – ideally small Madeiran ones – are cut lengthways and fried. Some restaurants caramelise them in butter with a little sugar, others fry them in oil, and others still cook them in passion fruit juice.
I’ve tried espada both fried and grilled, and I definitely preferred the breaded, fried version. The fish and banana combination was surprising, but on the whole a good surprise.
Espada com banana – recipe
Staying in an apartment with a kitchen and able to cook espada yourself? Do give it a go. Pop into the Mercado dos Lavradores in Funchal in the morning, buy some scabbardfish fillets and make this Madeiran dish your own way!
Ingredients (serves 4):
- 400 g espada fillets
- 4 small bananas (ideally Madeiran)
- 1 egg
- 1 garlic clove (crushed)
- Juice of 1 lemon
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 2 tablespoons butter
- Breadcrumbs or ground almonds
- Flour for coating
- Salt, pepper
- Oil for frying
Method:
- Season the fillets with salt, pepper, garlic and lemon juice
- Coat in flour, then egg, then breadcrumbs
- Fry until golden brown (about 2 min on each side)
- Meanwhile: cut the bananas lengthways and fry in the butter with the sugar (about 2 min)
- Serve straight away!
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