Salmon is one of the most popular fish in the world. More than a million people include it in their diet every day. Gourmets love it for its excellent taste; nutritionists recommend it as a source of vitamins and valuable trace elements - zinc, sele...
Salmon is one of the most popular fish in the world. More than a million people include it in their diet every day. Gourmets love it for its excellent taste; nutritionists recommend it as a source of vitamins and valuable trace elements - zinc, selenium, magnesium, phosphorus, and housewives respect it for its affordability and ease of preparation.
Humanity learned to catch salmon 7-8 thousand years ago. In the Middle Ages, it was already the most popular fish off the coast of northern Europe. Hiring to work in the noble families of Scotland, the servants even set the condition that she be fed salmon no more than twice a week. In those years, caught salmon exclusively from the shore, when it came close to the ground or spawned in the riverbed: with the help of cages woven from twigs or nettle nets. The fish was salted, smoked, and dried - this is how they prepared stocks for the winter.
A revolution in fishing was made by the Japanese, who at the beginning of the 20th century began to fish from the side of ships. They harvested about 55-60% of the total salmon in the middle of the last century. The emergence of industrial fishing, the construction of dams, reservoirs, and hydroelectric power plants led to the disappearance of the conditions necessary for the reproduction of salmon. To date, their numbers have declined catastrophically in Asia, and on the North American continent, salmon have practically disappeared. Only two regions have survived in the world, where commercial stocks of the main types of Pacific salmon, chum salmon, and pink salmon, have remained in historical volume. These are Kamchatka and Alaska. Moreover, if the commercial mass is exclusively wild salmon in Kamchatka, artificially grown salmon is also actively used in Alaska.
Several centuries ago, the first attempts to breed salmon were made in different countries. However, the most successful in this process were the Norwegians and Chileans - they are currently the leaders in the artificial cultivation of salmon. The first salmon farms appeared in the Norwegian fjords in the early 70s of the XX century. Brothers Ove and Sivert Grontverdt planted juveniles in a floating cage near Hitra Island, from which they successfully cultured the first Atlantic salmon. This is how modern aquaculture was founded - fish cultivation under controlled conditions. Today, cage-raised salmon is supplied to the market by dozens of companies. The largest of them sells about 450,000 tons of products per year. In addition to the sea, fish are now bred in ponds and lakes, and recent years also on land, using RAS (Circuit Water Supply Plant) technologies.
Disputes on which should prefer salmon: wild or cultivated, have been going on for several years. Ecologists make arguments in terms of protecting the environment. Some argue that fish farms pollute the ocean and threaten wild salmon populations. Others state that poaching has been significantly reduced thanks to farm supplies - it becomes unprofitable to catch wild salmon illegally. But ordinary buyers are more concerned about the consumer qualities of the product. So what is the best salmon?
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We understand in order. Salmon grown in industrial conditions is much fatter than wild salmon because it does not need to spend energy on getting its food. This is its plus - high content of OMEGA-3, but this is also a minus. Wild salmon meat is considered more dietary, and it has almost no white fatty streaks characteristic of salmon and much more protein necessary for our body. The essence of wild Pacific salmon is also considered to be much more helpful because fish on salmon farms are often supplemented with antibiotics and hormones to grow faster and are more oily.
Another important aspect is that red salmon often have paler meat when kept in captivity. This does not affect the taste, but not everyone wants to buy soft fish. Therefore, quite often, producers feed salmon with dyes. It is safe if they are made from crustacean shells. But such paints are much more expensive than synthetic ones. Therefore, farmers feed their salmon with a chemical that "pigments" the flesh to achieve a natural pink color. This process can have unhealthy long-term consequences for our bodies.
Both types of salmon are at risk for carcinogens due to water pollution, but wild-caught fish are much safer to eat than farm-raised. Studies have shown that wild Pacific salmon have the lowest levels of dioxins, a group of chemicals that are persistent organic pollutants (POPs) that are harmful to human health.
Today, Kamchatka remains the largest region in the western part of the Pacific Ocean, where the conditions for the natural reproduction of salmon have been preserved. Wild Pacific salmon lives here in natural states in saltwater, where useful microelements are collected, and only once in its life spawns in fresh rivers. This is the optimal time for catching fish: it has already absorbed marine vitamins and microelements. Nature is arranged so that salmon die after spawning, so timely catch does not reduce the salmon population in Kamchatka. Its red caviar is fully ripe and is an ideal raw material for a future quality product.
Located on the east coast of the Kamchatka Territory, Vostochny Bereg/Bering Seafood is the world leader in the fishing and fish processing industry, supplying the market with Far Eastern fish of all types of cuts, which are distinguished by unsurpassed quality and taste. The processing process at the company's substantial modern, high-tech complex, located on the eastern coast of the Kamchatka Territory, starts instantly and takes no more than four hours. The fish is subjected to deep freezing, thanks to which both the taste and valuable qualities of salmon are preserved. For almost 20 years, Vostochny Bereg/Bering Seafood products have been highly popular with consumers due to their freshness and naturalness. Its quality is confirmed by the Marine Stewardship Council and numerous international certificates. Vostochny Bereg /Bering Seafood is a multiple winner and laureate of international competitions in the nominations "Product of the Year," "Innovative Product," "Best Product," etc. Having tried Vostochny Bereg/Bering Seafood products once, the customer comes back for it again. So he gets the answer to the question: which salmon to prefer.
