Should I Order the Salmon?

Saturday night, my husband and I decided to check-out a new tapas restaurant near our home. By the time we were seated, our 8-year-old son was famished, and wasn’t shy about letting me know it. A procession of sangrias and small plates arrived -- fried manchego cheese, watercress salad, house cured salt cod, and seared duck breast. But Cal was hankering for fish. Not just any fish -- he wanted the salmon, and kept pointing his small finger to it on the menu, punctuating it with “Please, Mom?”

Last summer we vacationed in Tofino, on the western edge of Vancouver Island in Canada. We hired a guide and spent an afternoon fishing. Cal pulled in a small chinook, and we grilled it that evening for dinner. In his mind, all salmon come from pristine waters that are occupied by spouting grey whales and whiskery sea otters. But when I asked the waitress what kind of salmon it was, she looked puzzled. Apparently, she doesn’t get asked the question. Ever. It took a trip to the kitchen for her to come back with the unsurprising answer: farmed-raised Atlantic salmon.

Let me preface this with this statement: I absolutely know better.

But when a hungry kid is tugging on your t-shirt, it’s hard to explain that farmed-raised salmon is not the same kind of salmon he was dreaming about. So true confession? I gave in, and in a few greedy mouthfuls he had polished the plate, while my own appetite diminished and a load of guilt set in. I tried not to think about the sea lice.

Monday’s op-ed by Taras Grescoe talked about salmon specifically. He does a good job on explaining why salmon, farmed or wild, is something that he’ll now go without. I know some other food writers who’ve given up tuna entirely, or who’ve chosen to steer clear of foie gras, but food is something we cover as reporters. There’s no ignorance-is-bliss here. We are often more aware of issues surrounding the food we eat than much of the general public. I understand that no other protein on our plate is as complex as fish, but I made the wrong decision.

I don’t know if Grescoe’s conversation will be heard by people who aren’t inherently interested in the topic in the first place. With food issues, there’s a lot of preaching to the choir. In this case, I heard Grescoe’s lament loud and clear, and will use it as a reminder to explain to Cal that fish can be slippery, and that next time? He's getting the chimichurri chicken instead.
– Clare Leschin-Hoar

Image source: Feeding system on salmon farm, Salmon Farm Protest Group/Marine Photobank

Comments

[Mark Powell]

This makes me sad, I don't think you should steer Cal away from salmon. Instead, encourage him to enjoy the fish and connect with his fishy and oceany desires. Then work with him to identify some thing he can do to promote improvements in the way the fish is raised (if farmed) or caught (if wild).

He can donate $15 to a conservation group, or sign up as an online activist to send emails in support of good management policies (8 isn't too young).

Avoiding salmon is about as powerful as holding your breath until you turn blue. Nothing changes except you, and you suffer.

[Samuel Fromartz]

I kind of agree with Mark on this one. I have a problem with "don't eat this" since the other choices, if you look deep, have their own problems if you're searching for absolutes. Is farm raised chicken better than farm raised fish?

Also, while I appreciated Grescoe's op-ed, he simplified the picture of Alaskan salmon, so much so that the his conclusion was suspect. There's A LOT of sustainable salmon coming out of Alaska and not all of it is expensive. Frozen sockeye and coho is pretty cheap and decent (defrost it slowly in the refrig overnight so the moisture doesn't leach out and undercook it slightly). And at the height of the season, prices on the more fatty King salmon will start to come down.

Plus, remember, when you buy a sustainable species you're supporting the fisherman who do it right.

Or you can take Mark's approach and buy the red-list stuff and then seek out, in effect, a carbon-like offset by getting involved in sustainable fish issues. But wait Clare, you're already doing that!

[Cheryl]

Clare, this really resonated with me. We went out for sushi the other night, and I ordered a salmon roll. I almost always order salmon when I eat sushi, though for the same reasons as you, I felt terrible about the decision this time. I knew better, too, but I did it anyway.

Michael Pollan wrote about orthorexics, people with an unhealthy obsession with healthy eating. I feel like I'm falling prey to its corollary: sustainable-phobia. I'm afraid that the choices I'm making aren't always "right" and it's definitely causing anxiety. Maybe this is just tough luck, and the price I have to pay for occasionally making a questionable food/environmental choice.

[Clare Leschin-Hoar]

Mark, I love it! That is a very good idea. I guess two things about that night struck me. One is that for the most part, I'm still making the food decisions for my kids. If I cooked fish at home, I try to keep it wild-caught and local. And while Cal knows that food grown by our farmer friend, Jim Ward, taste better than what's at the mega-grocery store nearby, we really hadn't gotten around to having the "fish talk" yet. The other thing that caught my attention was our waitress undoubtedly serves that salmon many times a night, every night she works, and *no one* had ever asked her where it comes from before us!? No one? That's amazing.

And Cheryl, I definitely can relate. Sometimes knowing more makes my choices that much more difficult. ~~C

[Devin Harvey]

Hi Clare,

Thanks for taking advantage of the marine photobank resource. It's always nice to see our work out there making a difference. I have one request however, and that is that your credit state "Salmon Farm Protest Group/Marine Photobank," as it is written in the copyright statement that accompanies the image on our website. We have long-standing relationships with groups and individuals who donate their photos to us and we hate to compromise those ties. Thanks for understanding and thanks again for utilizing the Marine Photobank.

[Samuel Fromartz]

Devin, we corrected the caption. Thanks for your photo resource.

[OrganicGeorge]

Welcome to my world. At home I eat 90% organic food, on the road it tough. I try to find restaurants that have organic foods in big cities but in rural areas, for-get-a-bout-it.

Then there are the dinner parties. Are you supposed to cross examine your host to see if all the food is PC?

All you can do is do the best you can, try to effect change and don't stress about everything.

PS: I don't eat any bottom feeders or top feeders from the ocean. Those are the groups that concentrate pollutants. I'm such a hippocrate

[Mark Powell]

Cheryl, don't catch sustainable-phobia, it's not worth it. There are better approaches, and I don't quite view them like Sam, as unsustainable eating "offsets."

The ethical eating approach that works so well for produce just doesn't do anything to improve the supply of sustainable seafood. I have posted on this quite a bit at blogfish (click my name to go there). We need to band together and create a reform movement to get the attention of government regulators. It's the only way out of this mess. When we're done, every fish caught or grown in the US will be sustainble, making the choices easy.

[Babette]

Clare, that was a great post, and it finally sent me to the op-ed. I'd avoided it because I didn't want to read it...and as I did, I wish you could have seen my shoulders sagging...the weight of the sustainable fish world was pushing them down...But I'm glad I read the comments. Mark, Sam--thanks for the balance. While I will continue to avoid the farm raised salmon, I'll go ahead and pay for the good stuff (where I can--that has to travel awfully far to reach me here in S. Florida)--I'll look for locally caught fish more, too...I've managed to find some great resources.

Get to know your fishmonger, that's one of my new sayings.

Barb