Weekly Fish Reports

Wild Salmon
August 06, 2012

As sockeye salmon season fades each year, Alaska fishermen prepare their nets to target Coho, or silver salmon. Near Kenai lies Beluga Point, a peninsula jutting out into the cool waters of Cook Inlet where many people’s favorite wild salmon is now landing. Coho’s latin name, Oncorhynchus kisutch comes from the Greek roots onkos (hook) and rynchos (nose), alluding to their striking jaw hook that males develop during spawning season. Born in the river of their parent’s birth, coho fry remain in streams for over a year, moving seaward the following spring, returning to spawn when they are three years old.

Coho are a chef's salmon- milder than sockeye, but firmer than king salmon with less fat. Coho’s succulent pink flesh is a treat that everyone enjoys and at a next day from the water delivered price of $7.90/lb, they should find their way onto your menu for the next two months.

This season we contracted with a state-of-the-art processor in Bristol Bay to take a portion of our fishermen’s sockeye catch and flash freeze them at the peak of flavor. The fish will travel south by boat and train to cold storage facilities, allowing us to deliver beautiful red fillets to chefs around the country via FedEx Next Day Ground at a minimum carbon footprint. When carefully refreshed this frozen wild salmon challenges the quality of the freshest fresh, and when tasted side by side with any farmed salmon simply blows it away. They will be available by the time coho season ends, allowing chefs to continue creating delightful dishes with sockeye salmon and support Bristol Bay all year long. The story is good and the fish is better.

Good news on the fish fraud front; the Senate Commerce Committee has passed the Pirate Fishing Bill. It would become illegal to purchase IUU (Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated) fish, including fish caught in violation of a conservation measure, and to mislabel fish. If this bill makes it into law, it clearly raises the stakes for mislabeling and falsifying the country of origin and type of harvest, and we applaud it.

Our new friends at The Bachelor Farmer in Minneapolis got some love from the NY Times this week, embracing their Nordic heritage. With Atlantic salmon having gone the way of the buffalo, now only farmed salmon is harvested in Europe. Alaska’s wild salmon fishery is recognized as the world’s best managed. We should enjoy our national treasure.

SAFE seafood
July 29, 2012

“When people walk into a restaurant and put down hard-earned money for a favorite fish, they expect to get what they ordered” said Congressman Edward Markey last week when he and Barney Frank introduced a new seafood fraud bill. The Safety and Fraud Enforcement for Seafood Act, or SAFE Seafood Act would require fish packers, supermarkets, and restaurants to provide details about all seafood, including the scientific name, the market name, and the geographic region where the fish was caught. Amen.

In New England nearly half of the fish tested at 134 restaurants and markets was mislabeled. In Florida nearly one-third of 96 seafood samples collected from 60 locations was mislabeled. In Los Angeles, 55% of seafood is mislabeled. “It's clear that mislabeling is not a regional, isolated problem. It's a national problem that needs federal attention to impact the seafood supply chain,” said Oceana’s Beth Lowell. Transparency is the key. A consumer needs to be able to trace directly back to the fisherman and the fishery. Not only is this best for the man eating the fish, but best for the man catching the fish, and ultimately best for the fish.

Congratulations to National Geographic for naming our colleague Barton Seaver a fellow. "Barton has a personal passion for helping people connect their meal to the broader world around them and where it came from and who helped generate that meal. How did nature play a role in that? How did fishing communities play a role in that? How do folks working in the seafood sector trying to make living play a role in that?" asks Miguel Jorge, National Geographic's ocean initiative project director. The good word is spreading.

Summertime in the Northeast
July 22, 2012

As a heat wave baked most of America, some fishermen found cool breezes in the Northeast where both recreational and commercial anglers wait patiently for their favorite time of the year, striped bass season. While recreational guys have been able to live line bunker since April, the commercial season for striped bass finally opened in July.

There is no mistaking the feeling of hooking up with a striper. They slam into bait with such force and abandon your line whirls away in a fury until you’re able to set the hook and the fight can begin. The power that awes fishermen is the same reason striped bass is prized for its firm meaty flesh where it’s diet of bunker, eels and clams gives it a sweet delicate flavor. Open a box of these fresh line-caught stripers and smell the ocean. It’s taken a little time for everyone to get over their initial excitement, and dock prices have come back down to earth. They are landing both in Montauk and Cape Cod, and are a highlight of every summer season.

Small boats are running out south of Martha’s Vineyard with hopes of landing local yellowfin tuna. The steam to Hudson Canyon is not short, but the reward is usually well worth the time and effort. In the style of our friends in Tobago, Massachusetts fishermen are dropping metal jigs on hand lines with hopes of hooking up with yellowfin. The sustainability of a hand-lining is unmatched - one man, one hook, one fish - almost a zero by-catch fishery.

In NY and PA the controversy surrounding fracking of the Marcellus shale for natural gas is heating up. A new study is concerned with chemicals seeping into Pennsylvania drinking water, while chef and goodfood advocate Mary Cleaver discusses Fracking and Its Dangerous Effects On Local Farms. If you are in Brooklyn this week you can enjoy some delicious food from Mary, Michael Anthony of Gramercy Tavern, Peter Hoffman of Back Forty, Zak Pelaccio of Fatty 'Cue, and a host of others at a benefit called Taste of the Marcellus to raise fracking awareness.

As the Bristol Bay sockeye season winds down, awareness of the Pebble Mine threat increases. This week the Huffington Post asked people to share Sea to Table’s videos, as the EPA comment period ends. Remember, the best way to save a salmon is to eat a salmon.

Bristol Bay Sockeye
July 15, 2012

In spite of a late start and the lingering shadow of the threatened Pebble Mine, the great Bristol Bay sockeye salmon run is in full gear. Our friends Paul Greenberg and Barton Seaver have just returned from the bay in awe of the “unbounded, salmon-choked rivers”. Forty million salmon finding their way to the river of their birth to me defines miracle.

Rich, lush and distinctively deep vermilion in color, this year’s sockeye has been praised by chefs everywhere. The fish we’ve seen have been exceptional. It is difficult to believe that there are people who want to build the world’s largest open pit mine in this watershed. For the traditional fishing communities there, salmon have defined their way of life for thousands of years. The public comment period on the EPA assessment report ends on July 23rd, and we certainly hope for action to protect this national treasure.

When we told you, our partner chefs, that our last great wild salmon run was at risk, you didn't remain silent. Now chefs across America are showing their support for Bristol Bay salmon by featuring it on their menus for the duration of the season. In New York, Chef Fortunato Nicotra is serving a beautiful sockeye salmon caprese at Felidia. In Chicago, Jonathan Lane will have a 3-course salmon dinner available at Benny's Chophouse while the sockeye run lasts. Our Southern friends Andrea Reusing of Lantern in Chapel Hill, NC and Drew McDonald of The Plaid Apron in Knoxville, TN are cooking up unique Bristol Bay salmon creations. Out West, Bristol Bay sockeye is landing on the menus of the Kitchen Cafe Boulder and University Club of Portland. If you haven't yet, we encourage you to use your culinary talent to bring attention to this important wild food resource. Our fishermen friends in Bristol Bay are depending on it.

Fishy Clams
July 08, 2012

The owner of a NYC Chinatown fish market was arrested for allegedly selling dangerously dirty clams that she smuggled in on the luggage racks of passenger buses that regularly travel from Washington to Boston. Packaged in burlap, about a dozen packages would arrive on each bus Mondays and Tuesdays. Tests showed high levels of fecal matter and other bacteria that made the claims unfit for human consumption. “Bottom line is this: would you want to eat something stored in the luggage cart of a bus since at least Philadelphia?” asked Department of Environmental Conservation Officer Brent Wilson. Meanwhile, in response to worldwide outrage that the practice of “finning” sharks has decimated the shark populations of all the oceans, the Chinese government announced that they would no longer serve shark-fin soup at state dinners.

The growing problem of fish fraud does not seem to get the attention it deserves. A Boston Globe investigation found fish bought at restaurants across New England was mislabeled about half the time. Sometimes it was innocent error due to the opacity of the supply chain, but often the switch was deliberate, driven by profit. The solution is simple: know where your fish comes from. Our transparent model hopes to shed some light on these issues, as we are most proud of the fishermen whose catch we sell.

Striped Bass season opens in both Massachusetts and New York next week, and it looks like a bumper season ahead. Sockeye Salmon arrived late to Bristol Bay this year, but it looks like the harvest will meet expectations as more that 2 million fish have already been landed. With the mining threat to the world’s greatest salmon nursery remaining virulent, remember that the best way to save a wild sockeye is to eat a wild sockeye.

With reports that agribusiness giants Monsanto and Cargill are now aggressively marketing Genetically Modified Soybeans as feed to salmon farmers, one can’t help notice the similarity of aquaculture and industrial meat production. Once you look behind the curtain at a chicken processing plant or a fish farm, the protein does not taste quite as good. Scientists at Oceana have recently proposed that with proper management, the world’s oceans are capable of doubling the harvest of sustainable wild fish to help feed the world’s growing human population. I find the idea of supporting natural systems very appealing. We all know that happy chickens lay better eggs.

All Fish Report Posts

sea2table