Cod’s elongated body ranges in color from gray to green, brown to red. It has a paler lateral stripe and a characteristic little barbel under its mouth. Cod’s fine white flesh is the standard against which all other white-fleshed fish is measured.

Distinguishing between cod, green cod and dry salted cod
Jean-Michel Lorain, La Côte-St-Jacques, France

I’m often asked the difference between cod (“cabillaud” in French), and salt cod (“morue”). It’s the same fish, but the name changes according to how it’s prepared.

Cod
The name of the fish before it undergoes any transformation.

Green cod or green salted cod
A term sometimes found on restaurant menus and which refers to cod that has been salted, then desalted, but not dried. What a wonderful product! – yet one that is misunderstood and even disparaged. Its fine tasty flesh acquires a beautiful texture and retains all its juiciness if you take the step of placing the fillet in salt and letting it firm up overnight in the refrigerator before serving it.

Salt cod or dry salted cod
Fish that has been salted and then dried. It has to be desalted for a long time before use.