A few "bees in my bonnet' over this subject. As a kid, my Mother rarely bought fresh fish; it just wasn't available. Frozen foods were just coming into existence. There was at our "corner store' a wooden crate propped up at an angle, right on the counter, containing "smoked fish", no refrigeration. She bought them occasionally, for our lunch. I think they may have been herring, about 8-inches long, skinny and narrow. Never an issue about getting ill, they tasted OK, if very salty. Today, I wonder why they weren't teeming with bacteria. She bought canned salmon and tuna quite often. As a family unit, the three of us, had salmon patties for dinner maybe twice a month. My Dad ate what was presented to him, without too much derog, if displeased. Now, tuna casserole, that's another thing! The most delicious fish dish she made, her ingredients still lost to history, I cannot duplicate it. Then, "fats and oils" were universally bad. Today, "Omega 3 and 4" are "heart-healthy", and touted as a must in American diets. Salmon are among the fish high in those. We also take "Fish Oil" capsules, daily. Skipping Organic, I'm not impressed by the fact that Wal-Mart Stores have a giant frozen fish display, virtually every kind I've heard of, Cod, Tilapia, Orange Roughy, Tuna, salmon, "Wild Caught", pond-raised, virtually ALL carefully labeled in the tiniest of print, in some obscure location on the package, "Product of China" I gotta ask myself, how in the world can so much fish be packaged, frozen, kept frozen (??), transported half-way around the Earth, loaded onto transportation means, to be distributed throughout the United States, to stores everywhere, and SOLD at unit prices undercutting U.S. caught, and/or grown, product? I do not purchase Chinese product based on the unknowns presented. Frank
"Skipping Organic, I'm not impressed by the fact that Wal-Mart Stores have a giant frozen fish display, virtually every kind I've heard of, Cod, Tilapia, Orange Roughy, Tuna, salmon, "Wild Caught", pond-raised, virtually ALL carefully labeled in the tiniest of print, in some obscure location on the package, "Product of China" Saw a segment on Sixty Minutes once, about how the 'pond-raised' fish in China really survive .. it turned my stomach! .. filthy scummy conditions. Nothing healthy about that fish! http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/15/world/asia/15fish.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
Just about the only fish we eat is what I catch during the summer and freeze for later use.. I catch several species, but mostly Pike and Musky.. They are similar but not the same tasting.. Walleye, and Bass as well.. I make fillets and freeze them that way.. Most of my fishing is done in the north channel area of Lake Huron, however we have many lakes that I fish as well.. Now, canned tuna for my tuna casseroles... Canned salmon for my patties..
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-oe-greenberg-squid-seafood-20140713-story.html# After reading your posts here I decided to type in my search box: "How do they keep seafood frozen all the way from China?" and this is one of the articles that came up. Gives a whole new meaning to the words "fresh frozen seafood" for sure and makes me want to look for a landing where I can buy the seafood right off the fisher's mens boats from now on.
Maybe because salt is a preservative and the fact that it is smoked cures it. It lasts for 3 weeks if it's sealed and refrigerated. I buy my fish from Whole Foods which has a great reputation for freshness but you just never know unless you catch it yourself. Even then you can run into trouble if there are impurities in the water it came from. Some fish are highly poisonous when you're fishing, say, in the ocean. Shark has too much mercury because it's at the top of the food chain so all the other fish it consumes adds to the mercury level. Swordfish & King Mackeral has methyl mercury in it that can damage the nervous system of the unborn fetus. Researchers suspect that mercury, which comes mainly from industrial sources such as waste incinerators, the manufacturing of chlorine, and coal plants, is being spread through the air and eventually ends up in the water. Canned tuna is tricky. The mercury level in albacore tuna is 3 times higher than "light tuna". Canned White (albacore) – It’s suggested that children between 6 and 12 can eat up to 9 ounces per month. Women should eat no more than three 6 ounce portions per month, and men can eat three 8 ounce portions. Canned Light – This is a safer choice but look out for cans that are marked as “gourmet” or “tonno” tuna, as these come from the larger yellowfin tuna and have much higher mercury levels.
If I start worrying about where everything I eat comes from and what it goes through before I buy it, I will starve to death. I do the best I can though.
Isn't that the truth! .... just eat, and cross our fingers, and say a prayer that it doesn't give us cancer.
I had seen some of the pictures of the fish that are raised in China, and it was definitely enough to make a person think about not eating any fish that you didn't catch yourself. They had chickens in pens above the water, and the fish ate the chicken droppings. Pictures of the rivers showed unbelievable filth. After reading the article that @Babs Hunt posted, it looks like we have to be careful even when it says the product came from America, as well. I think that I also read something about the same procedure happening with chickens. It used to be that most of the chicken in the store was a whole chicken, and you took it home, cut it up and then cooked it. Now, a lot of the chicken is in smaller pieces (nuggets, fingers, etc), and those are also processed overseas. We sell them the whole chickens, and they send us back Chicken Nuggets so we can buy them from McDonalds and have them for supper . We have come a long way from when people grew and processed their own meat and caught wild game and fish. Even though it makes life a lot simpler for the modern day housewife, I think we suffer from less healthy foods with the processing.
I've mulled over this chicken-droppings used as feed thing, and come up with mixed conclusions. Why? Look closely at a container of plant food. Many are no longer inorganic chemical based, to provide the Potash, Phosphorus, and Nitrogen needed as they once were. Now, they are "All-Natural", which the fine print further defines as "poultry waste". So, the poultry caca goes into the vegetable plant's root system, provides nutrition to the plant, and ultimately we eat the vegetable. Does it then contain the nasty stuff we perceive to be in chicken droppings? Maybe not, but unappetizing to me, nonetheless. What about animal intestines being used as sausage casings? Invariably, my Mother peeled the "skin" off hot dogs, and threw it away. Some ate it, still do. Much of today's sausage product is still made the same way. What about the prior contents of those intestines we eat? About the fish, then. Excrement from animals, poultry included, contains bacteria, lots of it, and left-over chemical products from the animals' physiological processes. But, the bacteria, if we consider that to be the most harmful to us, is kept "at-bay" within the living fish, and is either passed through it's digestive process, or destroyed, or part of both. Surely it does not enter the fish's muscle tissues, for that would kill the fish. We eat those muscle tissues only, not the guts, or their contents. So, the question becomes, do the Chinese people themselves eat fish grown in this manner? Frank
Think I read human excrement contains, like, 15% E, Coli bacteria. Those critters are everywhere! Ingested in very great numbers, cause " food poisoning", for sure. Genetic material from E. Coli are now being inserted onto the genome of sweet corn, for human consumption. I don't like that, much. Thank Monsanto Company.
What they do to our food sources now days definitely in my opinion has alot to do with all the digestive problems and probably many of the cancers and other illnesses people deal with these days. Even catching fresh fish, etc. yourself is "iffy" because of waste, etc. that is emptied or leaked into our waterways, etc. So what do you do? Make the best choices you can and have faith for the rest.
There's problems with this too. The ground where they grow veggies, etc. is "iffy" also because it often has been saturated with leaking chemicals, etc. If you buy your veggies and fruits at your local supermarket you know they have been sprayed with poisons, genetically changed in some cases, and no telling what else. Even if you grow your own there is still the chance that the soil you are growing them in may have been altered in some ways by who knows what over the years. Even buying organic at the supermarket or local Farmer's market doesn't guarantee "purity" but is probably a better choice than your grocery store any day of the week. With all the knowledge out there these days about what is going on with our food supply the best thing we could do is raise and grow as much of our own food sources as possible. For many of us this is possible to a certain extent...for others it is a very limited possibility. Do the best you can do and have faith for the rest.