FRESH APPROACH IS URGED TO QUESTION OF FROZEN SEAFOOD

NANCY GRIFFIN

BOSTON -- Is fresh seafood better than frozen?

Knowledgeable people in the seafood, retail and food-service industries, as well as some fishermen, say that's the wrong question for seafood sellers to be asking in this age of top-quality, frozen-at-sea products.

They add quickly that purveyors better find the right question, agree on a correct answer, and start telling their customers the same story before they drag weary, sales-stopping seafood misconceptions into the next millennium.

"The question should be: 'What's the closest thing to just-caught?' In many cases, frozen seafood is much closer to that state than so-called 'fresh'," said Eugene Connors, seafood specialist with food-service supplier Hallsmith-Sysco, Norton, Mass.

"Fresh is not the opposite of frozen, it's the opposite of rotten," Connors said.

He's been fighting for decades to educate people who handle seafood in the "science of quality" -- a measurable standard that recognizes and defines the most desirable seafood.

"It was not inferior freezing techniques that gave frozen seafood a bad name, it was the so-called 'fresh' product that was frozen," said Connors, who spent more than 20 years as a skipper of fishing boats out of New Bedford, Mass.

Carl Salamone of Wegmans Food Markets, Rochester, N.Y., whose seafood departments all operate under a Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point system, said the chain tries to minimize confusion for customers by spelling out exactly what it's selling. Salmon is the No. 1 seafood item in terms of tonnage.

"We'll carry fresh, wild salmon when it's available and it's a good quality and value," said Salamone. "When we buy frozen-at-sea fish, such as Alaskan sole, we advertise it as frozen-at-sea. When we thaw it out, we say it's 'thawed for your convenience."'

Chef Gary Ranier Puetz, whose business in Washougal, Wash., is called The Seafood Steward Inc., agrees that industry-wide accord on terminology would help. "We've played a semantics game with the consumer using all these terms," he said.

Despite all the various words, and their meanings, those interviewed by SN all agreed that any serious discussion about the merits of fresh or frozen seafood must begin with establishing best practices for freezing the seafood.

"A fish is a huge chemical factory," explains Gleyn Bedsoe, associate dean for science and technology with Northwest Indian College in Bellingham, Wash. "Enzymes in a living body break down food. When an organism dies, these enzymes stay active and begin to break down the body itself. This process is accelerated by bacteria, most of which work better at higher temperatures."

This tendency to try to 'save' borderline fish by freezing it gave frozen product a bad reputation that, years later, clings to frozen seafood like a bad odor.

"The industry still tries to resurrect fish just short of the dumpster by freezing it," agreed Bruce Gore, owner of Triad Fisheries in Seattle.

Gore is credited with being the first fisherman to produce frozen-at-sea 'designer' fish, marketed under a label bearing his name. He has fished and frozen sea king salmon from Alaska's waters for 22 seasons. Now he has 27 boats in his program, each one producing fish to his specifications, with each fish tagged, frozen and branded on board.

"The object is to have the product from each boat indistinguishable from fish that come off my [own] boat," said Gore. "We want the uniformity of aquaculture in a great, wild, natural fish."

Puetz, an avid seafood proponent and a booster of high-quality frozen seafood, credits Gore with changing consumer perceptions.

"I've held a series of wild salmon seminars for executive chefs on the master level," said Puetz. "I fed them Bruce's fish that had been frozen for eight months, without telling them it had been frozen. They all thought it was fresh."

Although high-quality frozen products exist, sellers remain confused by the conflicting terms, such as frozen-at-sea, twice-frozen, previously frozen and refreshed, say the experts.

"No wonder there's confusion in the mind of the consumer," said Byron Easley, vice president of sales and marketing for Hilo Fish Co. in Hawaii. He believes confusion accounts for the gradual drop in per-capita consumption of seafood in the United States over the past several years, from 16 pounds to 15 pounds.

"We have to solve this problem. Where do we go from here in redefining 'fresh?"' asked Easley. "We need to abolish the double standard. The industry has hobbled itself in this no-win battle between fresh and frozen.

"It's the last great battle about frozen food, and who's winning it? Beef, veal, pork and chicken," he said.

As a seafood processor who handles 80% fresh fish and the rest frozen, Myer "Jay" Bornstein, president of Bornstein Seafoods, Bellingham, Wash., said he refers to never-frozen seafood products as "chilled."

"The chief questions customers ask are: 'Are there bones? Is it fatty? Is it fresh?"' he recalled.

Bornstein recommended giving seafood department associates something to say before the questions. "Give them a 10- or 12-second spiel that says 'freshly caught off Ketchican, Alaska."' he said.

"Refreshed fish can work as high-quality fish," said Gore. "The key is proper, quick freezing in the first place and slow thawing."

Fish is not frozen until it reaches -20 degrees F or below, then the fluid in each cell becomes solid, he added. "If fish is held at any warmer temperature, you'll get enzymatic action in the frozen state."

Obviously, these experts report, if fish -- the most delicate of animal products -- is frozen toward the end of its usefulness and held at warmer than -20 degrees F, it will deteriorate further. If questionable product is frozen, even at correct temperatures, it will begin its final deterioration as soon as it thaws.

"You can't put quality in, you can only maintain the quality the product already has," said Connors. "That's why it's imperative that fishermen learn how important good handling techniques are, including the all-important temperature control.

"For years I was in the harvesting end of this industry and no one ever told me about bringing the temperature down quickly, how fast time out of the water affects the quality of fish," said Connors.

When he came ashore, he spent several years with the New England Fisheries Development Association in Boston on a quality project, helping fishermen learn better handling techniques, such as boxing fish at sea, or keeping whole fish on shelves in the hold. He explains that boxing and short-shelving keep the weight distributed evenly and avoid the pressure of thousands of pounds of fish on the bottom product.

Research for the quality project determined that properly handled, cod could have a 20-day shelf life. Considering that many New England trawlers went on 10-day to two-week trips to land the cod, fishermen who failed to handle it properly found the shelf life was very near expiration by the time they arrived at the dock, said Connors.

"I learned things in the four years on that project that I still use every single day in my present job," said Connors.