What's Good for Us and the Oceans
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Sodium: how low to go? p. 8 Summer tomato dishes, p. 13 9 serving-size tricks, p. 14 JULY/AUGUST 2013 $2.50 www.NutritionAction.com Pre-publication proof. What’s good for us and the oceans Seafood is good for our health. But the world’s growing appetite for fish isn’t so good for the creatures that inhabit our oceans. Roughly 30 percent of the world’s fish stocks are “overexploited”—in danger of collapse— according to the United Nations Food and Agri- cultural Organization. Another 57 percent are fully exploited—at or close to their sustainable limits. Then there’s the threat from climate change and radoma/fotolia.com. © pollution. Here’s how to find fish that protect your health Illustration: and the oceans. Continued on page 3. The contents of NAH are not intended to provide medical advice, which should be obtained from a qualified health professional. The use of information from Nutrition Action Healthletter for commercial purposes is pro hib ited without written permission from CSPI. For permission to reuse material, go to copyright.com and search for Nutrition Action. The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) is the nonprofit health-advocacy group that publishes Nutrition Action Healthletter. CSPI mounts educational programs and presses for changes in government and corporate policies. © 2013 BY WWW.NUTRITIONACTION.COM © 2013 by Nutrition Action Healthletter, a division of the nonprofit Center for Science in the Public Interest. COVER STORY What’s good for us and the oceans Q: Anchovies can be more than None of those other species are valu- a pizza topping? able. In fact, many of them lose money Barton Seaver A: I happen to think that ancho- because of the ice, the labor, the gas, the is director of vies are delicious and wonderful. space in the hold, and all the expenditures the Healthy and I’ll take a pile of anchovies, grilled that go into catching the fish. So it often Sustainable Food up with a side of nut pesto, and goes overboard dead. Program at the put that onto a salad of fresh Each of those species is equally profit- sliced heirloom tomatoes, or able for sustaining the human body, but Center for Health stewed into a tomato sauce for they’re not profitable to the industry. and the Global pasta. I’ll take that any day of the We’ve created a system that skews toward Environment at the week. And yet, people don’t have waste and skews toward demand, rather Harvard School of access to those anchovies. than supply. Public Health. He is also a National Geographic Q: Is some seafood thrown out? Q: Because we ask for only 10 species? Fellow and the first Sustainability Fellow in A: Yes. By some estimates, 30 to A: Right. When you walk into a store and Residence at the New England Aquarium. A 40 percent of all that is captured say “I want cod,” you get whatever cod graduate of the Culinary Institute of America is unwanted by-catch, meaning is available, from wherever. When you that about a third of all seafood walk into a store and say “I want what- and an award-winning chef, Seaver is the caught is tossed overboard dead, ever seafood is freshest and best fits my author of For Cod and Country (Sterling Epi- bringing no benefit to humans. price point,” you get a better piece of fish, cure, 2011) and Where There’s Smoke (Sterling For example, in some fisheries because you’re asking for quality, not for Epicure, 2013). He spoke to Nutrition Action’s up to 10 pounds of seafood are species. Bonnie Liebman by phone from Boston. discarded for every pound of fish that is caught. Q: Why? Q: Are our oceans in trouble? A: In America, we eat about 16 A: They certainly are, for a host of pounds of seafood per person per year. reasons, from pollution to overfishing And about 95 percent of that comes from to acidification due to climate change only 10 species. And three of them— caused by increased carbon dioxide in the salmon, shrimp, and tuna—account for atmosphere. For a long time, we have not more than 60 percent of our seafood had a very healthy relationship with our consumption. oceans. We’re beginning to understand In American fisheries alone, there are how our irrational relationship with the hundreds of available commercial species, ocean is leading to deleterious health and yet we eat only 10. We have the most effects in humans. robust fishery management in the world, Q: How is our relationship irrational? but we do not take best advantage of what A: We don’t use what we take out of the the oceans can provide. So when we ask ourselves, “How do we oceans very well. About 20 percent of the Some fisheries end up with 10 pounds of entire global wild capture is not used to get more salmon?” we’re asking the wrong by-catch for every pound of fish caught. feed humans directly. question. The problem is that we make For example, the Peruvian anchoveta is demands of the ocean rather than asking Q: Do unfamiliar fish taste odd? the world’s largest single-species fish- what the ocean can provide for us. A: Come on over to my place for dinner and I’ll convince you otherwise. We have ery. And 98 percent of its anchovies are Q: Fishermen can’t sell unpopular fish? created these taboos or biases that are cooked down to a mush to create fishmeal A: When a cod net comes back into a really quite detrimental. and fish oil that goes to feed pigs, chick- boat, up with it comes pollock, cusk, ling, radoma/fotolia.com (top). Photo: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (right). Administration Atmospheric and Oceanic National Photo: (top). radoma/fotolia.com Each of those species is absolutely deli- © ens, and farmed salmon. And now we’re whitefish, dogfish, monkfish, wolffish, cious when treated as it should be. If you seeing this great influx of supplements, you name it. Yet when that fisherman treat bluefin tuna and cod the same way, cosmetics, and pharmaceuticals enhanced comes back to dock, only cod commands you are not going to get the same result. Illustration: with omega-3s from fish oil. a high price. > > > > > © 2013 BY WWW.NUTRITIONACTION.COM NUTRITION ACTION HEALTHLETTER JULY/AUGUST 2013 3 BaitCOVER & SwitchSTORY Looking for seafood that’s not endangered or raised on !sh farms that damage the environment? Here’s a list of substitutes from acclaimed chef Barton Seaver. But the difference Instead of... Try... saying, “Maybe we between cooking cod should look outside of and dogfish and wolf- Atlantic bluefin tuna pole-caught yellowfin tuna, blackfin tuna, alba- those 10 species to see fish and monkfish and core, wahoo what is sustainable.” pollock and haddock Atlantic cod Atlantic or Pacific pollock, Atlantic haddock Q: Should we avoid and hake and cusk is Atlantic halibut Pacific halibut farm-raised fish? not all that different. A: It’s a common mis- My favorite thing to do Chilean sea bass (Patagonian Alaskan sablefish toothfish) conception that wild with those fish is to just seafood is good and turn the oven to 275 freshwater eel Spanish mackerel farm-raised is bad. But degrees, lightly salt and grouper haddock, pollock, farm-raised barramundi, globally, farm-raised oil the fillet with olive lemonfish seafood now accounts oil, and throw it in. orange roughy tilapia, haddock, pollock for about half of pro- Q: At that tempera- shark domestically farmed sturgeon, lemonfish duction and consump- ture, won’t it take tion. So aquaculture shrimp Oregon pink shrimp, Maine pinks, U.S. farm- longer to cook? is here to stay. And it raised shrimp, Fisherman’s Daughter wild A: Yes. Your fish is go- Sonora Coast shrimp runs the gamut from ing to take 25 minutes environmentally just to cook. Meanwhile, snapper farm-raised barramundi terrible to restorative. you can cook some sturgeon/paddlefish (wild- sturgeon (domestically farmed) In some cases, it can broccoli and make a caught) even increase the brown rice pilaf. But yellowtail (imported) Kona Kampachi health of the oceans you’ll get all of that that it is raised in. succulent meat, with Source: National Geographic Ocean Initiative (ocean.nationalgeographic.com). For example, farm- all of the moisture and raised clams, mussels, richness in the fish, in- Q: Is it hard to find unpopular fish? and oysters remove the stead of having it dried out by high heat. A: Yes. If Americans only eat 10 species, excess nutrients that get into water systems You get a piece of fish that’s done to grocery stores are only going to stock 10. from agricultural runoff and pollution. perfection, not one that’s scorched under But stores are beginning to carry some of Nutrients like nitrogen and phospho- the broiler at 700 degrees. The difference these options, and they need consumer rous have created an abundance of phyto- between undercooked and overcooked at participation. plankton in marine and estuarine systems. 700 degrees is 30 seconds. The difference As giant retailers like Wal-Mart, Whole Well, why don’t we grow some delicious in a 275 degree oven is 10 minutes or so. Foods, Target, and Safeway and small farm-raised mussels down there that will mom-and-pop stores begin to look at sell- actually take in those nutrients and give Q: Why don’t people try new fish? ing sustainable seafood, they’re seeing that us fabulous protein? They increase the A: They say, “I’m nervous that it’s going quality of water and increase the profit- to make my house smell like fish.” But if ability of waterfront communities.