No crabs, no scallops: Seafood is vanishing from menus in U.S.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

At the Clam, there are no scallops.

Prices went “crazy,” said Mike Price, who co-owns the Greenwich Village restaurant, and so he yanked them off the menu. Over in Napa Valley, Phil Tessier, the executive chef at a popular spot called PRESS, did the same. And in Atlanta, at the tapas joint the Iberian Pig, chef Josue Pena didn’t stop at scallops. The Alaskan halibut and blue crab are gone, too.

That last one was a killer, Pena said. Crab croquettes had become a signature dish. “People were like ‘What’s up?’” But, he said, with wholesale costs soaring like they are, “the price we had to charge to be profitable was almost insulting.”

For restaurants across the U.S., the reopening from COVID-19 lockdown has been anything but easy. They’ve struggled to hire back enough waiters and chefs, often being forced to dangle double-digit pay hikes, and have been rocked by cost increases and shortages on all kinds of items — from condiment packets to takeout packaging and chicken wings. So this jump in seafood prices, part of the broader inflationary surge working its way through the U.S. economy, is only further squeezing restaurateurs just when they were supposed to be raking in cash as they recover from all those months lost to the pandemic.

Seafood prices rose about 11% in the 12 months through early July from the previous period, according to NielsenIQ. Stretch out the time horizon a little, Pena said, and the increases on certain hard-to-find products are much starker yet. A pound of halibut, he said, goes for $28 from the local seafood distributor he buys from in Atlanta. Before the pandemic, it was $16 at most. And blue crab has gone from $18 a pound to $44. But at least he can find crab. In Orlando, Brennan Heretick, co-owner of High Tide Harry’s, had to stop selling crab fingers because wholesalers in the region stopped offering them.

https://www.heraldnet.com/life/no-crabs-no-scallops-seafood-is-vanishing-from-menus-in-u-s/

[elleng]

1. Had soft-shell crabs Friday,

in Maryland.

[treestar]

8. Had scallops

last week - same state!

And there were crabs on the menu.

[I_UndergroundPanther]

20. I haven't had any crabs this year

And I live in Maryland the state with the most delicious blue crabs. Sprinkled generously with old bay.

That's it tomorrow I am getting a crab cake.

[elleng]

21. Have had crab cakes fairly often,

@ Solomons Island, one of several (outdoor) restaurants.

[no_hypocrisy]

2. One pound of jumbo lump crab (canned) is close to $40 in the stores.

[kimbutgar]

3. I always get ahi tuna at a seafood restaurant and they no longer carry it

There is another poke place I go to and the price has doubled in the last two months.

[BigmanPigman]

4. I went to my supermarket yesterday and

when I was shopping for fish and seafood I said out loud, to myself, "Shit, salmon costs more than filet mignon". I have always loved seafood and fish. At the local Asian market they have cheaper prices but they are still way above the prices 5 years ago. Since I am on a fixed income I buy "old/almost bad" food and this goes for fruits, veggies, seafood, etc. For years I was able to buy lobsters that were not too active for $5 a lb. Not anymore. The price has tripled in 5 years. This is beyond mere inflation.

[Blues Heron]

5. The days of plundering the endless bounty from the sea are over

plus- microplastic - ewww!

[lpbk2713]

6. I have had a can of oysters in the back of my freezer for a couple of years.

I haven't gotten around to throwing it out.

Maybe I should sell it on eBay?

[paleotn]

9. Not sure if where you're at matters, but....

I'm not seeing the price escalations. Haddock and cod are running at normal prices. Lobster rolls aren't much more expensive than normal. Strange.

[tavernier]

10. We have all the seafood we want.

We can’t get chicken wings.

[Grasswire2]

11. what the hey is a "crab finger"?

Here in the Pacific Northwest, crabs have CLAWS.

[SamKnause]

22. Just a guess but similar to chicken fingers.

Diced crab breaded and fried ???

Just a guess.

I know little about seafood due to the fact that I dislike most of it.

[Grasswire2]

25. sounds horrid

especially now that we know that fast food restaurants lie about content of items. No tuna in the tuna sandwiches at Subway.

Shivver.

[ProfessorGAC]

12. Shrimp Is Way Up

We get shrimp a lot. We've noticed a major uptick in price, especially for the lower count products.
The giant, 4 count bag went from $32 to $40 for 2 pounds.
The 12-18 wasn't that dramatic, but I'd say 15%.

[Bucky]

13. My grandparents during the Great Depression rarely had seafood

They survived. Apparently there was other food in Oklahoma.

There will come a day, probably next year, with seafood back to its normal prices.

This is inconvenient, but it's not America's darkest hour. This is what happens when 45% of your adult population resists getting a vaccine from a deadly pandemic.

[GulfCoast66]

15. Growing up in South Louisiana we were not poor but hardly middle class.

We survived on Seafood. Dad had a 15 foot bateau and we would freeze up tons on fish, crab meat and shrimp. Crawfish too.

I remember as a young kid when there were not really big ice chest. We would fill up the cooler and throw the fish in the bottom of the boat till it was almost covered! None went to waste I guarantee you that.

Back then you could recreational shrimp trawl even off a small boat. We loaded up on them as well.

This was in the early 70’s. And that’s also how those folks on the bayou survived the depression.

We very seldom had beef.

Fortunately I never got tired of seafood. It’s still my favorite and like my dad I catch my own.

[Bucky]

16. Eating local is better for your pocketbook and better for the environment

As a general rule of thumb. Nothing is absolute of course, but it's probably key component to slowing global climate change

[GulfCoast66]

18. Well, if you have a 22 foot boat and a big truck to pull it.

Plus several thousands in tackle plus all the other costs, it not great for the pocket book! The boat holds 80 gallons of gas!

But we love being on the water. I look at it like other hobbies like golf, tennis and bowling or anything else. Except I get many multiple great meals out of it.

I’m a long way from my dads 15 foot bateau! Every time I go out I feel sad I could never take my dad out fishing. He would have loved a boat that is somewhat comfortable and runs 45mph. He passed when I was 23. I’m 55 now. But there is not a single fishing trip I don’t think of him. And he was also a good democrat!

[csziggy]

14. A local seafood place is known for their crab cakes

They are now off the menu. Instead they are offering salmon cakes.

This place is known for buying local Gulf seafood. Tallahassee is close to the coast so fresh seafood used to be easy to find, often from people selling on the roadsides. I haven't seen any of that since the BP disaster.

Apalachicola used to be famous for their oysters. Between the BP mess and the reduction in freshwater flow from the Apalachicola River, oysters are nearly gone - though they are making efforts to farm them.

I'm not sure what this seafood place will do if they can't get seafood to sell - though they have added chicken to their menu.

[GulfCoast66]

17. I love blue crabs. But last time I went to buy a dozen it was over $50! Did without.

Fortunately we are pulling the boat to the coast in a few weeks for 4 days. We have crab traps we set out using the boat so I should catch 3-4 dozen. When we go for a week we’ve caught as many as 80! That’s a lot of good eating.

We will also be scalloping. Snorkeling around picking them out of the grass beds. Natures own Easter egg hunt. And should catch several messes of fish.

Nothing like fresh seafood.

[smirkymonkey]

19. Well, this is depressing.

I live in an area that is famous for it's fresh seafood, especially lobsters, clams and cod. It's always been pretty expensive, which is why I don't eat it very often, but I still love it and eat it whenever I get the chance. I would much rather eat seafood than meat.

[hatrack]

23. With seafood (as w. many things) there's a loss of memory of what once was . . .

Last edited Wed Aug 4, 2021, 07:25 AM - Edit history (1)

My brother moved up to Alaska in 1975, so he's definitely a native (if not by birth). Anyway, in the late 1970s through the early 1980s, you could get whole king crabs - the whole crab, not a little claw or three - for $10 or, occasionally, for $5. Roadside vendors would sell them around Anchorage from refrigerated trucks, holding them up with both arms outstretched and you couldn't see the vendor's face, the crabs were that big.

So, what happened to the king crab? 200 million pounds of the three species landed in 1980 dropped by 90% in 1985 and only one of the three species is still worth commercially fishing for. TAC (Total Allowable Catch) for red king crab was 3.8 million pounds for the 2019-2020 season, and the average weight for a male crab caught was 7.1 pounds.

https://www.nationalfisherman.com/alaska/king-crab-uncertainty-as-coming-season-hinges-on-biomass-calculations

So yeah, there was a natural bounty, and we took and took and took as much as we wanted, and now there's not much left. As the Bering Sea continues to rapidly warm, hard to say what happens now to what's left of the fishery.

As Aristotle noted, "Man finds forests, and leaves deserts."

[Grasswire2]

27. wow

Those statistics are very sad.

[roamer65]

24. Supply chains are breaking down.

Had an HVAC tell me today make my old AC unit run as long as possible. He can’t get new ones.

[brooklynite]

26. I have a reliable fish store which is always stocked...

...haven't noticed any significant price increases.

[Grasswire2]

28. Then you would be an outlier, evidently.

Maybe that's not a good thing.