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Author: Kenji Lopez-Alt (41 Articles)

J. Kenji Lopez-Alt is a contributing editor for Cooks Illustrated Magazine, runs a private chef business, KA Cuisine, and writes a weekly column on burgers and food science for SeriousEats.com. He is also an occasional co-host of America's Test Kitchen . Kenji holds a BS from MIT and lives with his wife in Harlem.

- by Elizabeth Bomze
Liz Bomze is a Boston-based food writer and Associate Feature’s Editor at Cook’s Illustrated Magazine. She has written for numerous Boston publications including Boston Magazine, the Improper Bostonian, and the Boston Globe. Please welcome her!

Similar to CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture), where consumers pay farmers’ costs up-front in return for boxes of produce delivered throughout the season, Community Supported Fisheries (CSF) like the Cape Ann Fresh Catch (CAFC) program out of Gloucester, MA help people form a symbiotic relationship with the fishermen and the seas.

At the beginning of the fishing season, customers front the fishermen a season’s share worth of cash which guarantees that their daily catch will bring in a decent wage, regardless of its species. In exchange, the participants are rewarded with the freshest fish native to the New England shoreline for the rock-bottom price of about $3 per pound —compare that to the $13.99/pound charged for fresh cod at a Whole Foods. Fish is delivered weekly to various Boston-area pick-up locations, including Jamaica Plain, Cambridge, Ipswich, Lincoln, Acton, and a few North Shore towns.

Its inception came partially as a response to the problem of overfishing. Essentially, the issue is twofold: First, we’ve all heard plenty about how restaurant-chic species like Chilean seabass and common commodity catches like certain varieties of cod have been essentially blacklisted from sustainably conscious menus due to gross negligence of the ocean’s ecosystem. To meet consumer demand, fishermen are driven to catch a species faster than it can reproduce, thereby driving it towards extinction—and driving the fishermen who make a living off that catch out of business. Secondly, there’s the issue of bycatch. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that one in four animals caught in fishing gear dies as bycatch—unwanted or unintentional catch. Nets drag the bottom of the ocean from boats, capturing not only the specific species the fishermen are after, but also tons of unwanted animals—including dolphins, whales, and sea turtles—that the fishermen toss back into the water, dead or dying, because they have no market value, are too small to sell, or simply can’t fit on the boat, where cold storage space for the most lucrative species is at a premium.

The solution? Actually, there are two schools of thought revolving around what “sustainable fishing” really means, and two (somewhat overlapping) factors limiting what fishermen have been able to catch: “green” labeling , and price . First, the classic labeling system (which is still pretty young) like the one from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program emerged as a result of both unhealthy fish farming (think salmon) and dramatic overfishing due to consumer demand. Twice a year, the program updates three categorized lists—“Best Choices (green), ” “Good Alternatives (yellow) ,” and “Avoid (red) ”—by adding and deleting various fish from each list as their projected sustainability changes. Proponents of the labeling program advocate fishing for very specific species (i.e. Pacific cod, not Atlantic cod) that are in abundance and harvested via environmentally friendly methods like catching shrimp via traps, which, according to Seafood Watch, allows fishermen to release 98 percent of unwanted fish alive. (Trap-caught shrimp make the “Best Choices” list.)

However, this system still has its critics. As a result of the labeling, fishermen are limited to catching only those species that will bring in top dollar—and throwing back everything else. It’s a “single-species marketing approach” that Niaz Dorry, Director of the Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance (NAMA) and spokeswoman for CAFC, blames for disrupting the ocean’s ecosystem. “These [green-labeled] fish are now being overfished because the fishermen are driven to fish for them.” She cites a specific example from NAMA: Atlantic herring.

“In the late 90s, herring was green-lighted by some seafood standards because herring populations were considered robust by today’s fisheries management policies…But Atlantic herring is a critical part of the diet of many recovering marine animals living in the waters off of New England… Many of its predators’ populations have drastically declined due to a variety of environmental stresses—including overfishing. Unfortunately, fisheries managers seem to look at the ocean as a body of water full of single species of fish we like to eat rather than an ecosystem. But… the relationship between the predator and the prey—such as that between herring and its many predators such as cod or whales or seabirds or bluefin tuna—need to be accounted for properly when management decisions are made.”

And that’s where the newer system proposed by the CSF model comes in. Fishermen participating in CAFC are assured upfront that they will get the same price for hake and redfish that they do for cod . “If all the fish has equal value to the CSF shareholders, the fishermen don’t have to seek out just the big-ticket fish,” Dorry explains. Sustainably speaking, this is good news in several ways. Catching—and keeping—the full cross-section of what’s native to the area, eliminates bycatch. It’s a matter of “throwing back what you don’t need ”—a common practice for commercial boats—versus “fishing only for what you do need. ” Additionally, rather than spending days at sea in search of specific, high-demand species, the majority of CSF boats function as dayboats, staying closer to shore, reducing their carbon footprint, and guaranteeing fish that’s in some cases days fresher —and much cheaper —than what is commonly available on the market.

What’s more, Dorry says, sustainability is a matter of scale. (No pun intended.) Example: Commercial vessels can average 1 million pounds per catch versus 5,000 pounds for local dayboats. If those commercial boats are seeking out green-labeled Atlantic herring or mackerel, she explains, they’re disregarding how that affects other marine life—in this case, basically scooping up the primary food source for recently recovering species like cod and stripers.

The oceans aren’t the only ones who benefit from the system. Ignazio (Naz) Sanfilippo, a North Shore native and veteran of the fishing industry for 40 years, mans one of the six participating boats from Gloucester harbor and applauds the efforts of Dorry and CAFC. “This has been a big help to us [fishermen] and consumers because it cuts out the middleman. Otherwise, [the fish] goes through three or four hands, and everybody puts a tax on it. Here, the boat comes to the consumer.”

The Local Approach
So, what’s the catch to the CSF? None , according to Dorry, who says that programs like this one and the Port Clyde Fresh Catch in Maine are changing the way both consumers and fisherman think about the seafood industry. “Discussions about local food don’t often include seafood,” she said. That’s why she, the Gloucester Fishermen’s Wives Association, and others in the Gloucester area—a fishing community for over 400 years—decided to approach the local fishermen last year about instituting a new approach to their harvest. For the pilot project they recruited six of the 20 Gloucester dayboats, which typically set out in the wee hours of the morning and are back at the dock by dawn, their nets filled with cod, haddock, whiting, flounder, hake, dabs, pollack, redfish, and grey sole.

If there are foreseeable challenges with the CSF model, one might be that there’s no choice in what shows up in your weekly share. Particularly adventurous palates or those who really know their fish might find this exhilarating and the perfect opportunity to enjoy variety and learn how to cook new species. Others could find the process daunting—especially since most of the fish comes dressed (cleaned and gutted, but not filleted). Everyone will want a sharp knife on hand, and rookies who missed the first CAFC pickup, where fishermen offered quick demos on filleting, can take a look at a filleting video that NAMA posted on its website.

What’s more, the CSF model works well for the small percentage of the population living in coastal areas with active fisheries—but it’s not a universal solution to a global problem, and one could argue that (at least at the moment) the tagging system better addresses the problem on a larger scale.

Dorry notes that the success of this project depends on shareholders being open-minded about what fish they’re getting and patient so that this grassroots experiment can evolve. So far, so good. The response has been tremendous: Seven hundred and sixty-six people signed up for the first season. “That’s about 700 more people than I thought,” Dorry said, noting that there’s a waitlist of 700 more. “People have been excited to get new stuff like whiting,” a very firm, relatively small species that’s best cooked whole. Two more boats signed on for the second season, bringing the total to eight—a number Dorry and participating fishermen hope will increase in the coming months. Plans are also underway for a possible shrimp CSF this winter; check the NAMA website for updates.

Those interested in signing up can download a contract to print, sign, and mail in with your payment. Participants can sign up for either a full ($360) or half ($180) share for 12 weeks; that’s a weekly lot of 8-12 pounds or 4-6 pounds unfilleted fish (3-4 pounds and 1-2 pounds after filleting), respectively. As with a traditional CSA, the fish will be delivered each week to one of several designated locations listed on the NAMA website; updates about delivery times and changes will also be posted there regularly. And speaking of the website, it’s become quite the forum for members to blog about their CSF experiences, ask questions (which Dorry reliably answers) and share recipes like smoked Pollack and fish tacos. Yum.-