This high-valued species is the favored sea bream, prized in Mediterranean cuisine and highly regarded by European chefs. It gets the “gilt-head” name from the golden stripe between its eyes. The Romans reportedly called the bream “Aurata,” the gilded one. The Greek goddess Aphrodite also considered the gilt-head bream sacred. The fish reach maturity during their second year, up to which time they are male. In the third year, for reasons not fully understood, they become female. Sea bream are found in the Atlantic and Mediterranean, but commercial harvests are small. As with European sea bass, bream is increasingly supplied by aquaculture operations, mostly in the Mediterranean. Some is also raised in Iceland in geothermic water. A small member of the porgy family, Sparidae, sea bream usually run 10 to 14 inches long and between 1 1/4 and 6 pounds. Upscale chefs in the United States menu bream by its French name, daurade, or daurade royale.