fauren

March Miscellany

A hodgepodge of some other tidbits I've been meaning to share over the last week:

In the ongoing story of the Westland/Hallmark Slaughterhouse debacle and ensuing beef recall, Westland/Hallmark president Steve Mendell testified before a congressional panel last week, contradicting his earlier written statements by admitting that it's possible downer cows from the plant entered the food chain. (Washington Post: Slaughterhouse Owner Backs Off Claims, New York Times: Meat Packer Admits Slaughter of Sick Cows)

Chinook (a.k.a. king) salmon have literally disappeared from Bay Area waters, meaning the regional fishery there will most likely remain closed through this year's season. The causes are unclear, and though populations farther north may still be fished this summer, don't expect your Alaskan king salmon to come cheap. (New York Times: Chinook Salmon Vanish Without a Trace)

The Times has led me to find a CSA with a pick-up location mere blocks from my apartment. YAY. Sunday's Dining & Wine section featured a piece about the folks behind Hearty Roots farm in Tivoli, NY. (New York Times: Leaving Behind the Trucker Hat)

And finally, yesterday I came upon the website of the Green Edge Collaborative, which is dedicated to discussing "how our consumption choices affect our social, environmental and economic worlds – in our local neighborhoods as well as the global community." I'm excited about this discovery and hope to attend the potluck on the 30th, since home composting is at the top of this spring's to-do list. Report to come!

FishPhone!

Well, if you're unsure of buying and eating a certain fish next time you're craving seafood, Mark Bittman has a suggestion in his latest post on Bitten, his blog with the New York Times: send a text message. The Blue Ocean Institute has a service that allows you to send a text with the name of the fish in question and receive a message in return that contains the Institute's rating, along with other information about safety, population, and certification where it applies.

I'm going to try this during my grocery excursion this evening. Too bad they can't also send me a message about the guy selling me the fish... last time I went to this particular market, the fish man picked his teeth with his gloved hand just after handing me my salmon.

New York Times: Shopping for Fish
Blue Ocean Institute: FishPhone

Dangerous Mercury Levels In NYC Tuna

Today's New York Times ran a disturbing piece by Marion Burros on mercury-tainted tuna found in sushi restaurants around New York City. I'm very sad that my personal favorite for sushi indulgence, Blue Ribbon, was at the top of the list. Any chance the one in Park Slope doesn't use the same fish as the one in Manhattan?

*chirp chirp*

Awareness of the ethical, environmental, and health concerns surrounding fish seems to be on a steady increase these days, as Michael Ruhlman notes in his latest. Maybe the fact that the underwater world is basically invisible to most of us has kept attention largely off overfishing, by-catch, water pollution, and other issues surrounding the consumption of fish (not to mention that fishing itself by definition takes place far from the public eye), but no more... Even the Food Network has acknowledged it in some small way; when I flipped it on earlier and found a seafood cook-off, I was informed that one of the judges was William Hogarth from the NOAA Fisheries Service.

If you're worried about the fish you're eating, tuna or otherwise, there are a number of handy guides for choosing fish put out by organizations throughout the US. In addition to the NOAA Fisheries Service guide, FishWatch, I've listed a few here.

New York Times: High Mercury Levels Are Found In Tuna Sushi

Updates 1/24:
Turns out, some folks don't care all that much: Warnings Don't Deter Lovers of Sushi.
Also, in today's Diner's Journal blog at the Times, Marian Burros discusses the more wide-spread presence of mercury in fish, as confirmed by a new report from Oceana.

Something's Fishy

The New York Times ran a pretty good article last week about the debate over organic fish: Free or Farmed, When is a Fish Really Organic?

Good question. 

The debate settles largely on two things: carnivorous versus herbivorous fish and wild versus farmed fish.  The first issue is decidedly more clear-cut than the second (though it's all relative), since the USDA organic guidelines as they stand for land animals require that those animals are fed a strictly organic diet.  It's a bit cyclical, but basically a carnivorous fish can not be labeled organic if its feed -- other fish -- is not certified.

As for the second issue, the matter gets a bit more hairy.  Martin explains the divide between fishermen and those in the aquaculture industry over what should be considered organic in terms of the fishes' living conditions.  Aside from a brief mention of the opposition to aquaculture for its common side effect of water pollution, though, there is no discussion of extant pollution, which can have an enormous effect on the quality of seafood meant for human consumption.

To be fair, I was reading the seafood section of Marion Nestle's What to Eat when this article was published, so I think this absence was a bit more glaring to me.  The thing is, pollution seriously affects a lot of the fish Americans eat on a regular basis, including canned tuna, swordfish and the fish that's at the heart of this organic debate -- farmed salmon.  But since pollution affects both farmed and wild fish, how can anyone say one is more deserving of an organic label than the other?

This article highlights something that's been driving me absolutely crazy of late, and that's the hype around all things "organic."  Lobbies and regulations and marketing have given that word such a strict meaning that it's easy to lose sight of its purpose: to produce food that is both good for us and good for the earth it's raised on.  In my opinion, that goal is so much more important than any certification that, when it comes to seafood, it makes a lot more sense not to worry about "organic" and instead question the origins and environmental impact of the fish we want to eat.  Luckily, several organizations have worked to put out guides that do just this.  They rank fish according to health and environmental factors in order to make our seafood choices a little easier.  I picked one up at the conference at Princeton in November, and it fits nicely in my wallet.  I must say, it's come in quite handy.

If the USDA can find a way to effectively incorporate work like this into their organic guidelines for seafood, more power to them.  But until then, let's not stress over semantics.  If you're interested in keeping yourself safe or are concerned about the environment (or better yet, both), I'm certain that any one of these guides will prove helpful.

Oceans Alive project at the Environmental Defense
Seafood Watch from the Monterey Bay Aquarium
Seafood Choices Alliance

Adventures in Swordfish

My afternoon class is not meeting this week, which gave me a chance to hit the Union Square farmers market (East 17th Street and Broadway, Manhattan) after work yesterday.  I didn't have my trusty extra tote bag with me so it wasn't a big trip, but I knew I wanted to get something to cook this week that I wouldn't normally make.

Enter the swordfish.

I don't cook a lot of fish, mostly because I don't trust myself to do it well, mostly because I don't cook a lot of fish.  So I was on a mission to break this vicious circle.  Blue Moon Fresh Fish (Mattituck, NY) has tempted me with their dry-erase board fish list in past trips to the market, and after making a couple other stops, I approached the kind woman behind the counter to order a couple of swordfish steaks.  She said I could pick out my own, but before I had the chance she stopped me and grabbed two steaks herself, holding them out to me.  "I'm giving you these because they're the best pieces.  See that?" She pointed to a little peninsula of meat at one end of the steaks. "That's the best part.  They don't usually include it."  Of course, she could have told me anything and I'd have smiled and nodded just the same, but I appreciated the gesture.  It's all part of the charm of farmers market shopping.

So I toted my swordfish steaks home (along with lots of other goodies, including some delicious late-season tomatoes) and studied some cookbooks for ideas.  The possibilities!  Not good for us indecisive folk.  It wasn't until I turned my key in the front door this evening that I finally decided on how I would put dinner together.

I made a dill aioli for the fish, wanting something simple but flavorful.  And my god was it flavorful.  I will probably still be emitting garlic from my pores at dinner time tomorrow night.  The fish itself was broiled with olive oil, salt, and pepper.  I covered the rest of my meat-and-two-veg meal with yellow wax and green beans in lemon butter and a salad of Boston lettuce, radishes, walnuts, goat cheese, and a balsamic mustard vinaigrette.  Everything but the dressing ingredients, butter, and walnuts came from the market, and that felt pretty good.

If I do say so myself, I tasted this meal, and I am awesome.  That's actually the whole point of this post.