September 20, 2021 Small World Seafood Update

Well, well, well...Did people have fun with crudos, sushi, hamachi, raw scallops, seared scallops, salmon, oysters...We loved seeing all the pics you sent us of what you do at home! Honestly, I know it can be fun to go out and order this kind of food but how much fun is it to make it at home!! (And how much cheaper, right?) Check out our Insta to see what others are making..stunners!

A year and a half ago, many of you were nervous about cooking mussels. Now you are making crudos and poke bowls...hahaha..brilliant!

A quick note about email. Those using yahoo have noticed emails coming to you a day late. We are trying to get them pass us through but this is out of our hands for now. If you use yahoo, just know that all of our emails are also posted to our website immediately as well.

Well, you all have heard me talk about the supply issues going on with seafood. It felt like things were peaking a month ago but now I don't know. Honestly, the backlog of containers combined with the high price of raw commodities is causing more of a squeeze and lots of fear on the supply side. Let me explain that. So, for example, there is very little frozen inventory of dry sea scallops, if any. Normally, the price of fresh scallops is kept lower in the markets by the availability of frozen scallops which are cheaper. So, fresh scallops compete with frozen scallops and need to be not too far in price or no one would buy them. Without frozen scallops in inventory and overall supply now being much lower, the price of fresh scallops can float to match demand. This past summer, the price of scallops doubled. 

Now here is the inertia that this creates. If you are a scallop processor who wants to freeze them to resell, you would have to pay a very heft price right now to do so. That's a big investment you would have to risk for future sales. And what if scallop prices happen to drop in few months and you still have inventory? You got it...there goes the business. You lose your shirt. No one wants to do that so no one is freezing, the scallops boats can't get too much volume because processors aren't buying, supply stays low and prices stay high. Clusterfrick. Yeah, frick. Now, repeat that with lobsters, crab meat, tuna, etc and you can see why we are where we are. Something will break eventually and someone will be on the wrong side of the ledger..

Okay, kids. That was the lesson for today. No quiz. Just for your smartypants cocktail hour 'did you know' chit chat. 

For this week, it is a little hard to tell what we will be doing. Some things are coming into focus but it's still a little too blurry for me. We may have a shot at sushi grade albacore tuna coming out of Georges bank in Maine. This is top of the line stuff. Not a ghundred percent yet but hoping.

I definitely know that the salmon of the week will be Icelandic  Arctic Char fillet! This wonderful, smaller cousin of Atlantic salmon is melt in your mouth good. Also sushi grade and great for poke bowls and sushi (with our housemade ponzu, of course). Or use our miso glaze, marinate for 30 minutes and up to 24 hours to get an amazing dish. And don't forget, that miso glaze is amazing with veggies, too!

Clams are the shellfish of the week. Not sure about oysters yet. There's an election up in Canada that is pre-occupying everyone. Shrimp shumai is around. Spanish octopus is back! Many of you have raved about the new smoked salmon so that's our line from now on. Dry sea scallops are definitely back. Those babies have been ridiculous, no? We will have a few special things coming up in the next few weeks too but for now, enjoy the beautiful weather and,

Look out for the order form Wednesday at 11am for Fairmount/444 N 4th

or Thursday at 9am for Fitler/Rittenhouse/Washington Squar

Peace,
 

Robert Amar

Small World Seafood

Owner