The Definitive Guide to Purchasing the Most Fresh and Sustainable Salmon
Salmon is a delicious, versatile, and amazingly healthy food. But all salmon are not created equal. The wild sockeye salmon that swim in the waters of Bristol Bay, and migrate up one of eight meandering rivers to their spawning grounds, are regarded as one of the healthiest, most nutrient-dense, foods on the planet. They are packed with Omega-3 fatty acids, those healthy fats that keep your heart, lungs, blood vessels and immune system working the way they should. They’re key to the structure of every cell wall in your body, and are essential for sharpening memory and improving mood. Salmon are also swimming with high-quality protein, vitamins and minerals!
But before you start stocking up on this prized food, it’s important to know what to look for when choosing salmon.
Let’s start with the word “fresh.” When you reel in a salmon from a riverbank, clean it and throw it into a sizzling pan on the campfire, that’s fresh! When you put the extra fish in a tote and drive home, that’s not fresh.
Fresh Salmon Should Look Vibrant and Moist
If you buy your fish in a supermarket, and it’s labeled “fresh,” check it carefully. It is hours, and perhaps days, old. Even if it looks good, know that its quality and nutrient value have been diminishing since it was caught. Deterioration and bacterial growth can start within hours.
You want your salmon to look vibrant and moist, with firm flesh, shiny skin and no sign of bruising. If you gently touch the flesh, it should feel firm, not mushy, and should spring back when you press down on it.
One indicator of freshness is color. Wild-caught salmon has flesh that is that famous, deep red-orange color due to the crustaceans they eat naturally in the ocean. Farmed salmon, which are penned and have been fed an artificial diet, would be gray or white without additives. Fish farmers usually add astaxanthin, a red pigment derived from crustaceans, to the fish-feed pellets to improve color and make the salmon flesh more attractive to consumers.
Pick Frozen Wild Alaskan Salmon for Freshness and Flavor
Imagine how many hours, or even days, it takes to transport fresh salmon from seiner to shore to truck to store. Imagine instead that a fish caught in a setnet on the shores of Bristol Bay is quickly bled and almost immediately placed in a tote of freezing cold slushy ice, and then transported just minutes away to the processing plant to be flash frozen - all within just a few hours or minutes.
Because it is a gradual process, regular “old-fashioned” freezing allows ice crystals to form between the fibers of the salmon, causing structural damage and reducing quality. Flash freezing, or blast freezing, is fast freezing; it’s an extremely low-temperature, fast-air-blast operation that stops the clock, locking in nutrients, flavor and freshness. Sockeye salmon that are frozen-in-time like this are the very best salmon to buy.
The Popsie Fish Company, a three-generation family of Bristol Bay setnet fishers, has just such a setnet/flash freeze operation on the shores of Bristol Bay, off the eastern arm of the Bering Sea. They call their fish “fresher than fresh,” because of the speed and care with which they catch, bleed and flash freeze their salmon, the most prized fish in the industry. Blind-study taste testers prefer blast-frozen salmon just as frequently as fresh salmon because of its similar or superior quality, taste and texture.
The Bristol Bay sockeye salmon fishery is the largest and best-regulated salmon fishery in the world. It is the model of sustainable fishing. Having record runs for the last several years. The Popsie Fish Company is proud to follow exquisitely sustainable practices, and to happily meet or exceed all government and industry requirements.
In addition to sockeye salmon, this company also sells Alaskan halibut, cod and sablefish. All are vacuum wrapped in individual six-ounce portions, ready to pop into a pan, oven or grill. Want to learn more? Head over to The Popsie Fish Company, where you can buy a sockeye salmon portion box, or a combo box of sockeye salmon and your choice of Alaskan whitefish.
Author’s Bio- The author is a fisher, and this article is a guide to buying the highest quality sustainable salmon."