Tuesday, October 4, 2016

Something Fishy





So, I live in the ocean state and I eat fish.

But pretty rarely, at this point.

I find it hard to find fish I trust at the store and I don't have the free time I did when I would actually drive down to a dock to buy what fish I cooked.
That is an option here, a pretty amazing option, but not so convenient.

By comparison, those fish on display at the more convenient market, well...
I read those display case signs pretty carefully.
If it has a grown or caught in anyplace vaguely suspect, it's a non option.  Really, do you trust the fish regulations in China or Russia.  Not a nationalist jab there, I don't trust the regulations here either.
It may not even be the fish claimed by that little sign in front of it.

Anyway, came across this article today on the whole seafood scene.  Here is a snippet-


The seafood industry offers a perfect storm for scandal: In sharp contrast with beef, pork, or chicken, more than 90% of the seafood we consume is imported, via a largely opaque and convoluted supply chain featuring numerous middlemen and minimal regulatory oversight. Plenty of low-cost products can look remarkably like high-value ones, particularly given that consumers very rarely see, buy, or cook whole fish (save a subset of relatively small and less coveted species). There are 400 to 500 commercially available species, yet, according to the National Fisheries Institute (NFI), 94% of the fish consumed by Americans is limited to just the top 10 most consumed among those, and the top three—shrimp, salmon, and canned tuna—account for almost 60% of sales. When almost no one knows what most fishes look or taste like, it's not too difficult for consumers to be fooled. If we actually get red snapper fewer than one in 20 times, how can we be expected to know the flavor of the real thing?

If you eat fish, it's worth a read.
If you order fish from a restaurant and enjoy that, you might want to skip reading it.  Ignorance is bliss and all that.


Another link to it.

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