In her seven years with Whole Foods Market, Kristina has focused on community relations – spending the last three years immersed in the Baton Rouge and New Orleans areas and loving the region’s culture and incredible people who make these cities unique.
For the third year in a row, Whole Foods Market proudly sponsored the Great American Seafood Cook-Off (GASCO) and we had a fantastic time doing it. We set up an information table on our unprecedented aquaculture standards, Whole Trade products, and Whole Deal booklets full of coupons and recipes along with a mini-store where the chefs shopped for extra ingredients. Of course, we provided special treats and samples for the attendees, chefs, judges and emcees.
Chef John Folse, who is often recognized as Louisiana’s Culinary Ambassador to the world, co-emceed GASCO with Sig Hansen from “Deadliest Catch”! Many fans were thrilled to meet him in person and hear his comments throughout the competition, which you may be able to watch on your public television station in the near future. The whole event stresses sustainable fisheries and local products – both are very near and dear to our hearts. Read the rest of this entry »
No doubt about it: wild Alaska salmon is delicious! You’ll find it fresh for a few short months each summer and we are busily stocking our seafood departments with the tastiest varieties found throughout Alaska.
But with so many seafood concerns these days – from overfishing to poorly-managed fish farms – how do you know that the salmon you are eating is good for you, good for the planet and will still taste good?
Well, here at Whole Foods Market we’ve made it our business to sell the highest quality foods we can find at the most competitive prices possible. We evaluate quality in terms of nutrition, freshness, appearance and taste, and this is true for our wild Alaska salmon as well!
Here’s a snapshot on how the wild Alaska salmon we carry in our stores fits into our overall Whole Foods Market quality standards: Read the rest of this entry »
Growing up in Hawaii, I had access to some of the most delicious, freshest fish imaginable. Unfortunately, salmon was not one of them! I only had access to previously frozen or canned salmon. So, at the time, salmon had too strong of a flavor – kind of fishy and mushy.
It wasn’t until I was a little older and moved to the mainland that I discovered the pure deliciousness of high quality fresh wild salmon. Since it is so versatile and easy to cook, I find I now eat salmon more often than any other fish, with wild Sockeye being one of my weekday go-to favorites. Read the rest of this entry »
Pacific Northwest native Mark Curran, our Facility Team Leader for Select Fish in Seattle, has been in the seafood business for 25 years, getting his start at the Pike Place Market in 1984.
Greetings from the great Pacific Northwest, home of magnificent wild salmon, which is now in season! In the midst of getting our best wild salmon values front and center in our seafood cases, I thought it would be a good time to bring you up to date about our unique involvement in getting wild salmon to your dinner plate.
In 2003, Whole Foods Market made a commitment to sourcing the best wild salmon by purchasing a seafood processing company in Seattle, Washington called Select Fish. For years, this small seafood company has excelled in selling the highest quality salmon found throughout the Pacific Northwest.
End of the Line, a documentary based on journalist Charles Clover’s book of the same name, is showing at a handful of film festivals and will play in some cities on June 8th-World Oceans Day. I had a chance to watch the film and have a few thoughts to share.
The film begins with beautiful footage of marine life and quickly (and graphically) moves toward its key message: The oceans are overfished and fish populations are in trouble. Some of the most well-known and well-respected marine scientists are interviewed in the film to confirm these bleak trends.
I appreciate the filmmaker’s intention to tell this important story about the oceans. Our oceans are under incredible pressure and overfishing is a HUGE problem. In their latest global status report, the FAO states that slightly over half (52%) of fish populations are fished at their maximum sustainable limits, and there’s no room for further expansion. An additional 28% of fish populations are overexploited, depleted, or recovering from depletion. Why this happens requires a longer discussion, but the short of it is that overfishing happens when fishing quotas (i.e. limits on how many fish can be caught) are exceeded, or because no regulations or ineffective regulations exist to control fishing. Sometimes regulations are on the books but aren’t enforced. And corruption in the market is a reality that undermines even the well-intentioned.
The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), the government agency that’s responsible for managing fisheries in U.S. waters, is asking for public comments on proposed policies for addressing what’s known in the industry as illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing (a.k.a. pirate fishing) and bycatch (unintentional or incidental catch) of protected species like whales and sea turtles. Okay, there are a lot of acronyms in that first sentence (I even left some out) but the point is: as citizens we have an opportunity to express our opinion about how these public resources are managed.
Here’s mine: Hats off to NMFS for addressing these critical issues! Together with my colleague, Margaret Wittenberg – Global Vice President of Quality Standards and Public Relations, we’ve submitted comments to NMFS letting them know that Whole Foods Market cares about sourcing seafood sustainably and minimizing the impacts of fishing on the marine ecosystem. To source seafood right, though, we need strong regulations that address illegal fishing because as a grocery store, we can’t police the oceans.
We’re urging our fishery managers to do everything possible to provide the tools necessary to help us avoid sourcing from fisheries that catch fish illegally or take protected species. For example, denying port privileges to nations fishing illegally and prohibiting the import of fish products in violation of these rules would be a huge step forward; it would put the onus of responsibility on nations to fish responsibly, rather than on a grocery store like Whole Foods Market to figure out who is fishing legally and who isn’t. Finally, there may be fisheries that operate legally within a country that is found to be engaging in illegal fishing in other sectors. Consequently, we agree with NMFS’ approach to have alternative certification procedures that allow products to be certified on a shipment-by-shipment or shipper-by-shipper basis.
Hi everyone! Since I put 20 years in with Whole Foods Market, mainly in seafood, before joining Carolina Classics Catfish Farm about three years ago, they asked me to tell the story about the farm’s evolution and support in creating the Whole Foods Market farm-raised (or Aquaculture) seafood standards. I also get to do some myth busting about catfish – one of my favorite things to do!
Whole Foods Market started doing business with Carolina Classics Catfish back in 1986 – there were only four ponds and freshly harvested fish would be delivered right to our store in Durham, NC. Super fresh and it tasted great!
Myth #1: Catfish tastes “muddy.” The truth: If it does, it’s not good catfish.
Because of the way we raise and harvest our fish, you’ll never get that muddy flavor, which is caused by algae blooms in the water.
In developing the newly enhanced Seafood Quality Standards for farmed seafood at Whole Foods Market, I had the amazing opportunity to visit farms in remote locations around the world to learn about the wide range of aquaculture practices used to raise farmed seafood. I’m often asked, “What’s the most amazing place that you’ve visited?” While every country and the people that I’ve met have been incredibly different and interesting, I often answer, “Iceland.”
Some people make very specific New Year’s resolutions. Not me. I’m more the type who knows that I want to improve things about my life but I leave it kind of open and general – who knows what could come up! Yet, after indulging in too many wonderful treats over the holidays, I definitely feel a need to focus on getting back to eating sane, healthy foods. So, I was thrilled when I heard about a tasty fish we are featuring in January: Arctic Char.
Shrimp farming and healthy mangrove ecosystems…Can the two go hand in hand?
The past few months have been an exciting time for seafood at Whole Foods Market. In July 2008 we released our newly enhanced standards for farmed finfish and shrimp. In launching these standards, we set a high bar not only for how our seafood is raised, but also for environmental performance in aquaculture globally. Our commitment to sustainability reaches beyond our own stores, which is why we’ve posted our standards on our website and contribute to share and discuss our work at conferences and meetings worldwide.
As we have received several questions from customers particularly interested in shrimp and wanting to know what Whole Foods Market is doing specifically to protect mangroves from the impacts of shrimp farming, I’ll focus this posting on the topic of mangroves.
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Greetings from the great Pacific Northwest, home of magnificent wild salmon, which is now in season! In the midst of getting our best wild salmon values front and center in our seafood cases, I thought it would be a good time to bring you up to date about our unique involvement in getting wild salmon to your dinner plate.
