Pride of Place
Mexico on the label means top quality, sustainable shrimp
Good chefs are obsessed with great ingredients. From basics like sun-ripened tomatoes and pristine fresh fish to such specialty items as imported cheese and exotic seasonings and condiments, from adobo to zahtar, they insist on top-quality products that provide superior flavor, value and freshness. But the story doesn’t stop there.
Today’s chefs also want to know where their food comes from. They want to know that it’s safe and wholesome and that it’s been produced or gathered in ways that they — and their customers — can feel good about. Anyone who pays any attention to menus has seen the telltale buzzwords: organic, grass-fed, line-caught, free-range, local, seasonal, natural, artisanal. It’s all part of a growing new trend that’s come to be known as “sustainability”—describing food that’s raised and harvested in ways that make a minimal impact on our resources.
Chefs these days are all over sustainability. “It’s the right thing to do,” says Daniel Bruce, chef of Meritage Restaurant in the Boston Harbor Hotel, who buys as much product as possible from local farms, organic producers and other sustainability-conscious sources. “Plus, I’m convinced you get better quality.”
He’s in good company, chefs from all over the country are paying more attention to where their food comes from.
Membership in the international organization Slow Food — whose mission is to protect “the pleasures of the table from the homogenization of modern life” and help preserve and promote traditional and endangered ways of producing food — has skyrocketed in recent years, to more than 80,000 members in 100 countries, many of them chefs and other food professionals.
Consumers are all over it, too. An article in The Wall Street Journal in February 2004 noted that people increasingly look to food companies to supply products that are environmentally conscious and to treat their employees ethically. As a result, the industry has developed several keywords to indicate where and how a product was obtained, such as “fair-trade certified’’ and “Rainforest Alliance Certified.”
“Sustainability issues are growing in importance,” concurs Matt Stein, chief seafood officer for Los Angeles-based King’s Seafood Co., who coordinates seafood purchasing for the company’s 12 restaurants.
“Ensuring quality for our guests is always job one for me, but customers themselves are becoming more aware of the need for sustainability in the food supply and for protecting the environment.”
SUSTAINABILITY’S GOAL
From its very inception, the Mexican shrimp industry has kept sustainability at the forefront of its goals. The close-knit fleet, traditionally manned by fishermen who take an active role in the stewardship of their precious, pristine waters, has been joined by a new generation of aquaculturists equally committed to treading lightly upon the land and seas.
A new Sustainability Review published in October 2004 by Ocean Trust lauds the Gulf of Mexico shrimp fishery for its emphasis on conservancy through voluntary closures, bycatch-management systems such as turtle-excluder devices (TEDs) and support of sea-turtle-recovery programs and other ecological measures.
“In terms of achieving maximum sustainable yields, shrimp fisheries have been and remain sustainable’’ says Thor Lassen, president of the Reston, Va.-based foundation.
In the Sea of Cortez (see Sidebar), where approximately 80 percent of the shrimp is provided by the burgeoning aquaculture industry, the situation is equally promising. Having learned valuable lessons from the Asian aquaculture industry, Mexican shrimp farmers have committed to enhancing rather than destroying habitat.
“This is an extraordinarily well-regulated industry’’ says George Chamberlain, president of the Global Aquaculture Alliance.
After instituting stringent protective measures for mangroves in the Gulf, the Mexican government has from the start worked closely with shrimp farmers along the Sea of Cortez, where most of the farming is carried out on natural salt flats.
“Shrimp farming [and its attendant irrigation systems] has actually helped turn parched areas of the Sonoran and Sinaloan deserts into lush, productive agricultural areas, generating both food and jobs for the Mexican economy,’’ explains Chamberlain.
On both the east and west coasts of Mexico, systems are in place to ensure continued sustainability of both wild and pond-raised shrimp.
“When confronted with challenges,’’ says Lassen, “the industry has responded with ingenuity in developing solutions that have made shrimp more sustainable from both an environmental and economic perspective.”
Chefs have become increasingly aware of this reality. “My customers worry more about where things come from,’’ says Josefina Santacruz, executive chef of Pampano, a contemporary Mexican seafood restaurant in New York City.
“They will ask their server, ‘Where is the salmon from? Is it wild or farm-raised? Does it have a lot of mercury in it?’,’’ she says. “I like to know that the food I buy is sustainably produced and wholesome. We all have to be as conscious as we can of that.”
“It is much more politically correct to put the words ‘white prawn’ on the menu than ‘tiger prawn,’ at least with the customers we have,’’ says Charles Ramseyer, chef of Ray’s Boathouse in Seattle, one of those most famous fish restaurants in the country. Being the type of place that specializes in wild Pacific Northwest product, Ray’s downplays the actual Mexican connection, but the truth is that wild-caught white shrimp from Mexico are the only kind of large shrimp Ramseyer will buy.
“The fact that they are ecologically sustainable is really important to me,’’ he explains.
But many of the issues affecting shrimp production are well below the typical consumer’s radar — or even the chef’s, for that matter. That doesn’t make them any less important, however.
There have been times, for instance, when certain shrimp imports have been banned from U.S. and European markets because of fears about high levels of antibiotics (including chloramphenicol) in the stocks. Antibiotics are often necessary to control disease in high-density ponds, which is one reason most Mexican shrimp farms use lower-density methods.
“We’ve seen shrimp populations in other countries brought to the brink of extinction by disease and overcrowding, and we’ve been able to implement sanitary measures and disease-prevention techniques before there’s a problem’’ says Daniel Gutierrez, general manager of Acuicola del Desierto, a shrimp farm in Sonora, Mexico.
PURITY ENSURED
Gutierrez and many of his colleagues employ a number of methods to ensure the wholesomeness and purity of their product, including onsite biologists, sophisticated water-
exchange systems, buying broodstock only from certified-viral-free hatcheries and producing their own fishmeal. Even the fishmeal is sustainably produced, as Chamberlain points out: “They only harvest short-lifecycle species like sardines, anchovies and other small fish in amounts that can be naturally replaced within one year.”
While all of this may have negligible meaning for customers, where a food comes from can make a big statement. Certain products from specific places have the perception of quality, rarity or superiority and therefore carry tremendously marketable cachet; just think of Russian caviar, Belgian chocolate or Costa Rican coffee and the images those ingredients convey. Like brand names, such products enjoy a “halo of quality’’ that impresses patrons, who are often willing to pay more for the premium connotation. Additionally, chefs want to show support for their favorite producers, growers and suppliers.
For these and other reasons, many menus today feature more information about the provenance of their ingredients, from Chatham Bay cod and Santa Barbara prawns to Laura Chenel goat cheese and Kennett Square mushrooms. Even such phrases as “locally grown field greens’’ or “fresh-caught fish’’ can be useful.
Mexican shrimp is just stepping onto this stage.
“Mexico is known for its shrimp, just the way Alaska is known for its salmon,’’ says Jay Styles, general manager of Wind & Sea restaurant in Dana Point, Calif., which menus “white Mexican shrimp’’ in its popular Teriyaki Shrimp entrée.
“That registers with customers, and that’s why we put it on the menu that way.”
“Identifying Mexican shrimp on the menu encourages a dialog,’’ says Scott Cohen, executive chef of Las Canarias, the New American fine-dining room at La Mansion del Rio hotel in San Antonio.
“Customers ask what that means, and it allows our waitstaff to do a little educating. Although they may not have known about Mexican shrimp before trying it here, they certainly understand about the quality.”
Of course, the strategy necessitates a little extra training on the part of the waitstaff, but since Cohen sees the front-of-the-house staff as his ambassadors, the extra effort is worth it.
“We tell them about everything that comes out of this kitchen — where it’s from, how it’s prepared, why it’s better,’’ he notes.
Needless to say, the waitstaff has also tasted everything on the menu; Cohen believes there’s no excuse for waiters not knowing what they’re selling.
This is in keeping with Las Canarias’s Texas-meets-Mediterranean menu, which puts a lot of emphasis on such local products and indigenous flavors as wild game, local pecans, corn, squash and a variety of different chiles.
“So of course we’re going to feature shrimp that’s caught right in the Gulf of Mexico,’’ says Cohen.
Talented chefs are drawn to high-quality, ecologically friendly ingredients. With their superior taste, texture and consistency, wild-caught and farm-raised shrimp from Mexico could be the Next Big Thing in sustainable menus.
The following text appeared in the April 2006 issue of Shrimp Business, published by SeaFood Business magazine for the Mexican Shrimp Council and Ocean Garden Products.
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