# Sustainable Seafood



## SeafoodDave (Aug 6, 2010)

As more and more information comes about about how important sustainable seafood is, I wanted to start a thread to see how important this issue is to you? When shopping do you notice if your canned tuna was fished sustainable? Are you willing to pay more for these products? I'm looking forward to starting a dialog about this!!


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## Chief Longwind Of The North (Aug 6, 2010)

Yes, I purchase sustainable seafood, as well as safe seafood.  I love swordfish, but won't purchase it but maybe once  year or so due to heavy metal and PCB contaminants in the larger ocean predatory fish.  I also purchase dolphin safe tuna, and avoid albacore due to contaminants.  Shelfish are favorites, but again, in moderation.  With the available information of the internet, it is fairly easy to educate oneself about sustainable fisheries, and what seafood is safe and nutritious.  Even without the danger of contaminated food, clams, crab, and lobster are not the healthiest of seafoods.  They can contribute to diabetes, and are high in cholesterol.

Seeeeeya; Goodweed of the North


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## Kayelle (Aug 6, 2010)

Here's a guide that could be useful

NRDC: Sustainable Seafood Guide


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## justplainbill (Aug 6, 2010)

Even without the danger of contaminated food said:
			
		

> How / why do they contribute to diabetes?  I'm familiar with the grease residue in the crab boiler pot but have not had this experience with hard clams.  Pound for pound how does the cholesterol level of these seafoods compare to egg yolks?
> Is cholesterol level in foods correlated to human blood serum cholesterol?


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## spork (Aug 6, 2010)

The Monterey Bay Aquarium in northern California, built next to the canneries of once the "Sardine Capital of the World," also publishes a pocket guide called "Seafood Watch" meant to be taken with you to your next grocery/market errand.  They will send one to you on request.  Their website is:  Seafood Watch Program | A Consumer's Guide to Sustainable Seafood | Monterey Bay Aquarium.


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## Chief Longwind Of The North (Aug 7, 2010)

justplainbill said:


> How / why do they contribute to diabetes?  I'm familiar with the grease residue in the crab boiler pot but have not had this experience with hard clams.  Pound for pound how does the cholesterol level of these seafoods compare to egg yolks?
> Is cholesterol level in foods correlated to human blood serum cholesterol?



My bad.  The link that I'm posting Shellfish may raise diabetes risk: study | Reuters  describes a possible link to diabetes.

Seeeeeya; Goodweed of the North


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## justplainbill (Aug 7, 2010)

Thanks, Goodweed, for the reply.


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## jet (Aug 7, 2010)

I try, although it often means skipping seafood altogether.


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## justplainbill (Aug 7, 2010)

Our approach to sustainability is to avoid waste.  For example, some are willing to take a bushel of clams or crabs.  We rarely take more than three or four dozen clams or 1/2 dozen blue claw crabs.  We are able to store our clams live for upwards of 6 months.  We bake 24 - 30 clams as a main course for 2.  If we steam 2 dozen clams the liquor from the clam opening and from the steaming is used to make a milk, bacon and potato based clam chowder.
With careful picking, 6 blue claw crabs (minimum size 5") yield about 16 ounces of crab meat.  We freeze the pickings from most all of our summer and early fall crab catch and make crab cakes from it during the winter and early spring.  Eight ounces of crab meat is used to make two portions of crab cakes.  Once in a great while we'll have crab meat salad sandwiches for brunch from freshly caught crabs.


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## Linux (Aug 12, 2010)

SeafoodDave said:


> As more and more information comes about about how important sustainable seafood is, I wanted to start a thread to see how important this issue is to you? When shopping do you notice if your canned tuna was fished sustainable? Are you willing to pay more for these products? I'm looking forward to starting a dialog about this!!



When you said 'sustainable', I immediately thought of fish farms, where in large circular pens, sea fish are reared. Now, I don't like farmed fish because it just doesn't have anywhere near the flavour of fish caught in deep ocean. Having lived abroad and seen fish farms close to the land where I lived, and seen tourists oblivious to the origin on their plate, I have to say NO to any farmed fish because of the unnatural way such are reared.

However, I am careful when buying skipjack tuna. For this I wholly trust our local supermarket whose buyer only gets stock from ethical fishermen. I would feel very bad about myself on discovering that in fact, the tuna I ate was actually - dolphin. I vote a "yes" to paying more - for meat, fish, only on the basis that it is ethically produced, and that includes canned food whose origins are reputable.


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## spork (Aug 13, 2010)

Today, I had a bagger at my local Safeway grocery store admonish me for purchasing a steak of yellowfin tuna on 40% sale, citing its "sustainability."  Can you believe it? an employee telling me not to buy their store's product?

I forgave her youthful indiscretion, unable to yet discern between being idealistic and ideological.  I gently explained that NOAA has graded the Atlantic Yellowfin currently at about 96% of its ideal, sustainable, population.  That's not too bad; I certainly shouldn't be scolded for my indulgence.  It is the Bigeye Tuna that is in a dire state of imminent extinction given current harvest rates.

That is one of my fears about quote-unquote "sustainable."  As the term broadens in reach from the scientific to the marketplace to the political and social, it becomes more blunt.  It is not a far-fetched future when the next time I buy a yellowfin tuna steak at Safeway, I will return to my parked car to find that someone has used a box-cutter on my wheels.


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## FrankZ (Aug 13, 2010)

spork said:


> Today, I had a bagger at my local Safeway grocery store admonish me for purchasing a steak of yellowfin tuna on 40% sale, citing its "sustainability."  Can you believe it? an employee telling me not to buy their store's product?
> 
> I forgave her youthful indiscretion, unable to yet discern between being idealistic and ideological.  I gently explained that NOAA has graded the Atlantic Yellowfin currently at about 96% of its ideal, sustainable, population.  That's not too bad; I certainly shouldn't be scolded for my indulgence.  It is the Bigeye Tuna that is in a dire state of imminent extinction given current harvest rates.
> 
> That is one of my fears about quote-unquote "sustainable."  As the term broadens in reach from the scientific to the marketplace to the political and social, it becomes more blunt.  It is not a far-fetched future when the next time I buy a yellowfin tuna steak at Safeway, I will return to my parked car to find that someone has used a box-cutter on my wheels.



Yeah, that would not have gone over with me, unless I was in a very good mood to start with.

"sustainable" "organic" "green" etc... nice marketing buzzwords.  feh.


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