some tips on fish

so i don't write that much about the whole chef thing...and by now i hope you get the "mis en place" thing is a veiled reference to the important bits and pieces of our lives...but i still love my profession... that being said i just finished a great article about sustainable seafood...it made me realize that most people don't have any idea what that means to you as a diner in a restaurant...personally i stopped serving "wild seafood" gradually over the past fifteen years...here in florida what became increasingly clear was that the wild fish that people eat were becoming scarcer and more expensive as our appetite for fish grew...coming from philly to florida...the whole fresh fish thing was screwed up anyway...fish came iced in boxes...most was harvested( meaning filleted or steaked and mostly boned)...it came with dock dates which honestly meant very little to me... as long as the fish didn't smell like fish... i took it in and served it...then i got to florida and because of the proximity to the docks i had to learn to "butcher" fish...i could actually drive to the docks on a Tuesday or Wednesday and pick the fish off the conveyor belt as it came out off the boats...in the mid nineties when i arrived here the grouper were huge as were the snapper, amberjack, mahi and tuna...i remember the first conscious decision i made to stop serving billfish...was when i was receiving... fish at the back of the restaurant...hundreds of pounds of fish...and one 3 foot long sword fish...i stopped...and realized that this baby was caught and kept...not released...and then it dawned on me that i needed to find out more about the fishing industry...what i found out was that boats can be out for weeks at a time...with fish in the hold for that long...so fresh became a joke...also the industry is ecologically unfriendly...diesel boats, low wages and profitability for boat owners and government sanctions add up to a noxious mess for the average chef...and thats when i discovered aqua farming...great seafood ...farmed largely overseas...but making great strides here in the states...grouper, salmon, redfish, pompano and even tuna are being farmed in pens off the coast of many asian, south american and now gulf coast countries...as the world becomes more aware of its impact on the seas the more the industry is self regulated to be as green as possible...so for me the only fresh seafood i eat the stuff i catch in my own back yard...so the next time you eat

at a bonefish grill..realize that the fish you like so much is farmed just like your chicken...which of course is a whole different kettle of fish