Sustainable Seafood – A Sampler
In which the E@L offers a tantalizing taste of an intensive course in Seafood
Dear Readers – I love seafood, as I bet many of you do too. In fact, seafood probably constitutes 90% of the protein that I eat, since I rarely cook any other meat. And seafood is much healthier to eat than most other types of protein. Because I love seafood, and believe strongly in its health benefits, I have begun teaching a class about seafood (ITRW, as they say, with real in-person students). And after doing all the research and preparation for the class, I want to share this information with the larger world. This posting is the start of a Substack-based course on seafood, called Sustainable Seafood. I’m offering this one for free, but later episodes will only be available to paid subscribers. So, I hope you enjoy it, and learn something from it. And I hope you will upgrade to paid status, so you can keep reading.
Chapter 1 - Seafood Basics
How much do you know about your food?
I want you to look at a photo of a food product and then answer some questions.
What it is?
What animal did it come from?
Where/how was it raised?
How was processed and marketed?
What species of animal did this product come from?
How many species of this animal do we use for food?
What country did it come from?
I’m going to bet you had difficulty answering these, starting with Question 1. You probably recognized that it was some kind of fish, but what kind? Where did it come from – the ocean, or a lake? Was it wild or farmed? Was it fresh or frozen? Truth be told, it is impossible to answer based on the photograph. I will provide the answers below, but first I want you to look at another picture and answer the same questions.
I’m guessing you probably answered questions 1-4 correctly: Beef (or steak); Cow (or more likely the male equivalent, a steer); on a feedlot (or a large ranch; farms are generally for dairy cattle); In a butcher shop or the meat department of my local grocery store. Score yourself 100% so far.
But what about questions 5-7? I’m willing to bet you could not answer at least one of those. The latin name for our domestic cattle is Bos taurus, as in Bossie the cow, and Taurus the constellation. In this system of nomenclature, Bos is the genus, and taurus is the species. It may not be important for you to remember that, but it is important to specify it, because we only consume one species of cow. Around the world, only one species of animal is used to provide beef products. If a virus were to suddenly wipe out all of the worlds’ cattle, we would have a tough time replacing them. Buffalo is close, but very difficult to domesticate. As for its origin, most, but not all, of the beef we eat in the United States is raised within the country.
What if I were to show you a photograph of chicken, or pork? I’m guessing you could probably answer questions 1-4 correctly again, but might have trouble with questions 5-7, so I’ll fill you in.
Chicken, obviously, comes from a chicken, known around the world as Gallus gallus domesticus. This animal has three names because the last one, domesticus, shows that it is a subspecies of the Indian jungle fowl Gallus gallus that has been domesticated. Like cattle, virtually all the chicken around the world belong to this one species. If they all suddenly disappeared, we could probably re-domesticate them from the wild version, but it would take time. Again, it was probably raised in the US.
Pork, obviously, comes from a pig. Specifically, Sus scrofa domesticus. There’s that subspecies again. Fortunately for us, there are a handful of similar species of pigs in the world, one of which is the European wild boar, which is often hunted for food. Our domestic pig is so closely related to the wild boar that they can actually interbreed. If all the world’s domestic pigs disappeared, it would not be difficult to replace them. And again, probably domestic.
The same can be said about the other two major domestic food animals, sheep (Ovis aries) and goats (Capra hircus). They each represent a single unique species that would be difficult to replace.
What’s that Fish?
Now what about that unidentified fish? We can’t answer questions 5-7 unless we can answer question 1. And herein lies the problem. This fish was labeled as “Whiting”. But the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) allows 19 different species to be sold as “Whiting”, and only three of those come from the US. This fish was probably wild, and captured from the ocean, but there’s a slim chance it might have been farmed. There’s no way to know what country it came from, unless it was properly labeled in the store (another problem we will address later), or how it was processed, unless we know more details about its origin. Around the world, humans consume hundreds of different types and species of fish. If any one of them were to disappear (which has effectively happened already) we just replace them with another kind.
Here is my last quiz. Suppose you were to go into a well-known fast-food chain restaurant and see an item on their menu labeled as “Fish sandwich”. Would you order it? I’m guessing you might. Would you ask what kind of fish it was? I’m guessing you would not. Does it make any difference to you? Should it?
But what if that same restaurant had a menu item labeled “Meat sandwich”? Now, I’m guessing you would not order it unless you knew what kind of meat it was. It would probably only be one of three choices (beef, chicken, or pork). Does it make any difference to you? Should it?
Why would you care which type of three possible meats was in your meat sandwich, if you don’t care which of several hundred kinds of fish were in your fish sandwich?
My point here is that we, as consumers, know a lot about our land-based meat products, but virtually nothing about our aquatic protein sources, e.g. fish, shellfish, and seafoods. But we should.
Seafood is Unique
Seafood is a unique type of protein source. It is the last food source for which we hunt more than we farm. It is highly perishable, and usually must be shipped over long distances from the source to our table. It can undergo many different stages of handling and processing. It can change forms, from whole fish, to fillets, to fingers, to cakes, to soups, chowders, and other unidentifiable products. It is almost impossible to trace the source of any seafood from the water to your table. There are hundreds of different species of seafood to choose from, many of which look alike. As a result, seafood is more likely to be mislabeled and misidentified than any other food source. Despite the best efforts of the FDA and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), most of the seafood we eat is not regulated or inspected for safety. There are many different opportunities to make errors in the handling, labeling, storage and preparation of seafood.
Why Should we Eat Seafood?
Fish and shellfish are one of the healthiest sources of protein. They contain complete proteins, including all the amino acids that are essential for life and health. Seafood is the best source of omega-3 fatty acids (about which more later). It has the highest ratio of protein to calories for any protein source. Seafood CAN be more sustainable than land-based protein sources (but not always). And seafood production generates the lowest greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) of any protein source, somewhere between that of rice and soybeans, and much lower than beef, chicken, or pork. In fact, eating seafood is the GHG equivalent of being vegan. Most seafood production uses no land or freshwater (except some aquaculture, to be discussed later), whereas domestic agriculture uses 50% of our arable land and 90% of freshwater resources. Seafood production also does not contribute to rainforest destruction (unlike other meats).
Seafood production benefits humans in many ways. Around the world, over 200 million metric tons (hereafter just tons) are harvested annually. Seafood production keeps over 3 billion people fed, and over 60 million people employed.
Admittedly there are arguments against eating seafood. One is that it is more expensive than other sources of protein. But then, we (carnivores) do eat steak. Seafood is prone to spoilage, leading to “fishy” smell and taste. But that is only true for seafood that has not been refrigerated or stored properly. Some people do have allergies to shellfish; they are excused. Some are concerned that the way we process and kill fish is inhumane, but that is of even greater concern for mammals. We should definitely be concerned about contaminants in our seafood, such as mercury (Hg), polyfluorinated alkenes (PFAs), and microplastics, but that is true for just about any food (especially chocolate!). And we should be concerned about the sustainability of our seafood products, but we can’t do that without recognizing that most land-based proteins are highly non-sustainable and subsidized with fossil fuels, nitrogen, and other protein sources. And finally, without proper labeling, how do we know what we are really eating? What is that fish on my plate?
But the overall conclusion is that eating seafood is better for our health, and that of our planet, than any other source of protein.
Learning Objectives
In this course, I am going to provide you with the information you need to recognize and differentiate between major types of seafood. You will learn how to distinguish them; how to know what’s local, what’s fresh, and what’s best for you; how they are they caught and processed, and how to prepare and consume them. This is NOT a cooking class, but I will share some of my own approaches to cooking fish.
In the next few chapters I will cover the following topics:
Seafood Production – What do we eat, how much, and where is it from?
Capture vs Culture – What is the source of our seafood?
Seafood Sustainability – What does “Sustainability” mean in the context of seafood?
Seafood Mislabeling – Is it fraud, carelessness, or avoidable?
Seafood Nutrition – What about seafood is good for us, and why?
Seafood Sources – Where do seafood species live, and how are they caught? What environmental problems are associated with fishing?
Following that we will delve into the specifics about major types of seafood, including:
Fish – Major types & sources
Crustaceans - Crabs, Lobsters, and Shrimp
Molluscs – Oysters, clams, and scallops, oh my
Other seafood – Miscellaneous invertebrates, seaweeds, etc.
General rules for choosing and preparing seafood
For each seafood item, I will cover the following topics:
Common Name: What do we call it?
Genus species What do scientists call it?
Where: Where does it live, its location, habitat, and depth
FAQs: What is unique about it: its dentification, biology, size, and ecology
Fishery: Where is it caught, and what methods and gear are used
Product: How is it processed, marketed, and sold
Status: Are the populations healthy, overfished, or endangered?
Health: Should we eat it? Exercise caution about it? Or avoid it entirely?
Sustainability: Is it High (i.e. no issues); Medium (with issues); or Low (Not sustainable). For this purpose, I will refer to reviews by three organizations:
Sea Food Watch (SFW)
Marine (or Aquaculture) Stewardship Councils (MSC /ASC)
Nutrition: What is the content of calories, protein, total and saturated fat, omega-3 fatty acids, cholesterol, sodium, potassium, and vitamins.
Palatability: And finally, do I like it? For this I will invoke the Stevens Palatability Index (SPI) on a scale of 1 (low) to 5 (high)
For more information
Seafood Watch, at the Monterey Bay Aquarium https://www.seafoodwatch.org/
Marine Stewardship Council https://fisheries.msc.org
Aquaculture Stewardship Council https://asc-aqua.org/
This posting is free for all subscribers. However, future postings of Sustainable Seafood will be available only to paid subscribers. To continue reading, please upgrade to Paid.
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