Pied à Terre – Sustainable Kingfish Tasting
Shane Osbourne
If you are a fish lover such as myself, you probably can’t help but be alarmed by the ‘S’ word – sustainability. A doubling of global fish consumption since 1973 has led to overfishing, leading to some fish species becoming endangered. The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations estimates that more than half of all fisheries around the world are being overfished. The issue of fish sustainability was further highlighted in the recent release of the film “The End of the Line”. Based on the book of the same name by Charles Clover, a former Daily Telegraph journalist, the documentary argues that unless the fishing industry is regulated, the world will run out of seafood around 2048, which would lead to starvation for 1.2 billion people. Furthermore, it shows that 50% of the cod fished from the North Sea is caught illegally, and that the waters of Newfoundland, once fat with fish, have also almost run out of cod.
But whatever the facts, the subject matter is poignant. Current rates of fishing is unsustainable. It was therefore positive to hear that as a consequence of this film, Pret A Manger and Marks & Spencer have announced that from now on they will only source sustainable tuna. There have also been calls for Nobu to drop the use of the endangered bluefin tuna.
This week I was invited to a lunch prepared by Shane Osbourne of Pied à Terre where an Australian farmed kingfish imported by the Australian company Clean Seas was being featured on the menu. I missed cookery school to go, so there will be no blog post on school this week, but it really wasn’t difficult trying to choose between slaving away in a kitchen and eating a meal prepared by a two star Michelin chef. But more importantly, I was curious to find out more about this product which Clean Seas claim is sustainable.
