Green
Be
by J. Michael Wheeler
When something is really your favorite, you might just love it to death. That seems to be the case with much of our favorite seafood, especially those that are at the top of our sushi list. Bluefin tuna,
Chilean sea bass, and grouper have been subjected to intense fishing pressure.
Bluefin tuna’s popularity, for instance, has led to high prices, overfishing,
and a critical strain on the worldwide bluefin population.
What’s a sushi lover to do? Well help is here in the form of several guides from The Monterey Bay Aquarium, the Environmental Defense Fund, and the Blue Ocean Institute. These guides will help you at the Sushi Bar or at your market’s seafood counter. Shop with the information in these guides to make choices that reduce pressure on strained fish populations and their habitats.
While L.A. has many food trends and fads and flash-in-the-pan food movements, it doesn’t have what one would call food traditions. It certainly doesn’t have seasonal food traditions (excluding the candy season of Halloween) because it doesn’t really have seasons. I was born and raised there, and until I moved to Boston, I didn’t know from strawberry-season, or maple syrup-season, or apple-picking-season. In L.A., it seemed there was always corn or strawberries or apples. And they always tasted the same. Kind of “what’s the big deal?” flavored.
