Community Supported Fisheries 2.0: A Personal Take
Fri, Jul 9, 2010
Farmers, Food Enjoyment, Meat Recipes, Recipes, Sustainability
Author: Liz Bomze (4 Articles)
Liz Bomze lives in Brookline, MA and works as the Associate Features Editor for Cook's Illustrated Magazine. In her free time, she freelances regularly for the Boston Globe, Boston Magazine, the Improper Bostonian, and Martha's Vineyard Magazine; practices bread-baking and canning; takes photos; reads; and watches baseball.
Last fall I posted a story about the surge of Community Supported Fisheries (CSF), specifically the program out of Gloucester, MA called Cape Ann Fresh Catch (CAFC). A brief summary of how it works: Just like the produce Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) model, participants pay upfront for that season’s share. The money helps guarantee that the fishermen will make a decent wage off his/her catch. In exchange, they drive dayboat fish to various designated locations in the city each day, where customers come and pick up their share.
In response, I got a few (totally fair) questions about whether or not I had actually bought into a share myself. Unfortunately, I had not at that point; my work schedule didn’t allow me to get to the dropoff locations in time, and, frankly, it was too much fish for me to take. But this Spring an offer turned up that was too good to refuse.
One of my coworkers who already had a share noticed that the dropoff route on Tuesdays went right by our office. She called CAFC and proposed a scenario: If she could drum up enough interest among the staff, would they be willing to make a dropoff at our office? Sure, they said, provided we get about a dozen shares worth of sign-ups.
That wasn’t hard. In the end, we actually got about 20 people, I think. But other than the convenience of ocean-to-door service and a huge walk-in fridge to store the fish until the end of the workday, it turned out that there were a bunch of folks interested in sharing shares, which made the whole program very doable for a lot of people, myself included.
The other appealing factor: This season CAFC offered three different types of shares—all whole fish, all fillets, or alternating, in which you get whole fish one week and fillets the next. Seemed like a perfect opportunity for a beginner like me who wanted to learn how to work with whole fish, but didn’t want to be committed to that kind of project every week.
This season is about 13 weeks long, and I think we’ve just passed the halfway mark. Happy to report it’s been working out really well. On Tuesdays around 3 p.m., my coworker who organized the relationship with CAFC gets a call from the delivery guy when he’s getting close to our office. She and I grab a huge cooler and meet him outside, crosscheck our lists of how many whole fish and how many fillets we need, and then haul the cooler upstairs and everyone can take their share. Fortunately, some the America’s Test Kitchen staffers have a good bit of experience filleting whole fish and they’ve been kind enough to give a few demos on how it’s done. (CAFC also offers a how-to video that’s very informative.) Oftentimes a week’s share is one whole fish, so those of us sharing shares often grab a knife and fillet at work to divvy up dinner. We also chat each other up about what’s on the menu that night: cod and corn chowder, baked fillets with romesco sauce, Thai fish curry, whole fish stuffed with fennel and citrus and grilled…
My personal go-tos have been ceviche and fish tacos. The first couldn’t be easier—citrus juice, fresh chiles, red onion, garlic, herbs, a little extra-virgin olive oil mixed with chunks of raw fish for an hour or so until the meat “cures.” I find it’s a forgivable preparation for those of us who are still less than savvy with a fillet knife (it just takes practice, I keep telling myself), fast, and delightful to eat in the summer. Fish tacos have been a rotating preparation for me; most times I dip them in beer batter and deep-fry them, but this past week I broke out my new charcoal grill, slicked down a piece of aluminum foil with vegetable oil, and threw the fish (on the foil) onto the grates. Sort of a lighter take that I’d wanted to try for a while, and the fish took on some good smoke flavor from the hardwood. Anyone has other good suggestions what to do—especially for whole fish—I’ve still got about 6 weeks worth of fish to go!
What a great idea for getting fresh fish! I wish we had something like that here in the Milwaukee, Wisconsin area (although we do have an amazing fish market – Empire Fish).
I made this “Grilled Whole Red Snapper with Citrus-Ginger Hot Sauce”(link below) the first time I ever tried cooking with whole fish – it was silly easy and tasted amazing. I imagine you could use any similar fish with good results.
Recipe from Cooking Light, posted at http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=1809133).
This is such a great system. I wish there was more of this around the country, especially in Milwaukee @Mary Louise, as I know there are some great lake fish up there.
When you order the seafood is any information provided in terms of catch method, gear type, etc.? I would also wonder if any of this is bycatch. What type of fish are you getting in the share? I read in the comments of your previous post that people are just getting cod, is this still the case?
Good question Andrew. We all need to keep asking those questions. I won’t support a farmer dumping pesticides in my water table just because he’s a family farm. Why would I support a fisherman who’s destroying the fishery? In my opinion, though others disagree, the fishermen are not entitled to my support along with free reign to fish whatever they choose, however they choose. I truly wish they would commit to some transparency and accountability, until they do, I bow out.
I agree that too many are too vague about their methods. Another reason to get to know and trust the people doing what you care about and support them.
I love the expanded notion of the “Community Supported ….” model. I also love that this model not only shows how producers can be supported by community, but also how the system itself supports the development of community. Sounds like you and your co-workers have a new point of connection around the fish distribution and sharing preparation ideas.
Hi Liz,
Thanks for the update! A few questions:
-what fish are you getting?
-what’s your honest opinion of the practicality of whole fish for home cooks? Keep in mind that they don’t work at Cook’s and don’t have the resources that you have
-what fish are you making ceviche with? many local fish are parasite prone (cod, haddock, hake, flounder, etc) and citrus juice will not kill the parasites. So you might want to be careful with serving them raw or marinated no matter how fresh they are.
Thanks for the comments/questions, and apologies for the delayed reply. At the moment, the only questions I can answer completely are Helen’s, but I’ll look into the other great queries.
Variety is not this program’s great asset. We tend to get a mix of cod, hake, pollock, and flounder/sole. I asked one of the fisherman a couple weeks ago about why we don’t get other species like striped bass, bluefish, and shellfish. He had a couple answers:
1) Mollusks like clams and mussels require an entirely different license in Mass., and that would cost the fishermen more. Shrimp season is in the winter. Apparently, lobster are a possibility (not sure why they don’t fit under the shellfish umbrella) and they might consider including them occasionally in future seasons.
2) The fish that we get are generally all around the same price point, whereas fish like striped bass and bluefish fetch a higher cost. Including them would drive up the cost of the shares, they said. More significantly, they say that they can’t guarantee catching enough of those species to distribute equally among the roughly 800 shareholders.
I just got through cleaning, filleting, and cooking today’s catch: grey sole. This was a whole-fish week for alternating shares, and I ended up with 6 whole sole because the person I share a share with was out today. Gotta admit, it was a lot of work, especially since I was learning on the job. It wouldn’t be practical for me (a rookie) on a very regular basis, but I think most curious cooks can handle filleting fish once every other week. As long as you reserve the time, the results are worth the effort.
As for ceviche, your point is well taken. I wasn’t aware of the parasite/worm problem until a coworker mentioned it, and I’d made cod ceviche at least once before that (with no ill effects, fortunately). Since then, I’ve made ceviche with hake, because I was told that those fish are not as parasite-prone; is that not correct? I’ve learned to spot worms in cod, but haven’t seen any in hake.