Hey, I’m Mike Cruz.
I’m a fish expert
and I’m here to show you how to shop
for the freshest fish from the supermarket
to the fish counter.
Some major things you should be looking for
and a few red flags when it comes to buying fish.
[upbeat music]
So, here’s what to look for when buying salmon,
wild or farmed.
Key things you’re looking for is a nice smooth texture,
over the fish.
You want it to be plump and firm.
You don’t want it to be soft and squishy,
where if you touch it,
your finger kind of goes in.
You want it to bounce back.
Wild salmon tends to be a richer color,
a lot less fatty, a lot more solid and lean meat,
while the farm fish,
will have beautiful stripes of fat in it.
It’s a little bit more on the pink orange side of things.
You want this to be one solid piece.
You don’t want it to be breaking apart
or ripping should smell like nothing generally,
but in a really good example.
Sometimes salmon even has a cucumber melon scent to it,
which is really nice.
Ask to smell it.
Totally not weird to do that at all.
So, now let’s talk about a couple red flags
when buying salmon.
In front of me I have a piece of farm raised salmon
that has seen some better days
and I have a vacuum sealed wild option.
This fish is pretty soft.
It’s kind of starting to break apart already.
It’s beginning to get a little bit of a yeasty smell,
which is something that salmon does tend to get as it ages.
When you’re looking at frozen vacuum sealed salmon,
there are a few things just in the store in the bag
that will give you a good indicator of what kind
of life this fish has had.
You definitely wanna look and see if the bag is tight,
you can sort of pull it apart.
It should retain that seal.
You wanna look for ice crystals,
large ice crystals on inside around the bag,
are all indicators of time, temperature, abuse.
This fish has probably been frozen and unfrozen
and frozen and unfrozen,
and you don’t know how many times or for how long.
As the ice crystals form and reform,
what they’re doing essentially
is exploding the cells in the salmon.
As it thaws, it’s going to be leaching a lot of water
and a lot of that water is moisture and flavor.
I’m looking at the liquid it’s sitting in.
I’m looking at the separation of the meat.
I mean, there are chunks falling off here and there.
There’s discoloration happening.
Take that how you will.
Okay, so let’s get into tuna now.
So, I have some really beautiful loins in front of me.
This is Yellowfin tuna.
It’s a great example.
One of the things you really wanna be looking for
is these distinctive muscle fibers that tuna tends to have.
You want them to be nice and tight.
You don’t want them to be separating or soft.
You want to be able to almost see,
through the edges of the fish.
And what I like to do
is I’d like to get a little bit of a light on it.
You can use your phone
or any sort of flashlight you have around it.
You should be seeing a ring around the tuna
of transparent redness,
should look like nice, bright candy
and there should be a beautiful sheen on the fish.
You want the tuna to be nice and moist.
You want to have a general uniform texture
and it should feel nice and hefty in your hand,
not squishy or soft.
It should feel like a steak almost,
because it is tuna steak.
So, this piece of tuna here has skin on still.
It has the bloodline intact
and the bloodline should not really have all
that much of a smell at all.
There’s a trend here.
You’re gonna be smelling a lot of fish
if you want to get high quality fish.
Some places actually do grill it and it is totally edible.
Generally speaking,
it usually has a very strong iron taste to it
and the longer it sits on the tuna,
the longer that flavor gets into the rest of the meat.
So, it’s imperative to remove it as quickly as possible.
I would have my fishmonger cut this bloodline out
and remove this bottom layer of skin.
So, in front of us now we have a piece of tuna
that is commonly referred to as saku block.
Usually this is sold as a ready to eat sushi item,
just ready to slice and go.
Something you’ll notice about saku blocks right off the bat
is they feel spongy.
They have a somewhat unnatural firmness to them.
I mean, we saw tuna should be a deep red,
but this saku block is just unnaturally vibrant.
Almost all saku tuna has been treated with carbon monoxide.
What that does is inhibits oxidation in the fish.
It will look just as good three days out
as it will three weeks out.
So, essentially with tuna,
you want something that’s deep red, vibrant, firm, glossy
and don’t be fooled by the pink stuff.
Let’s get into shrimp,
most popular seafood in America.
So, here we have fresh defrosted,
white leg shrimp and then here we have frozen.
Generally speaking,
you’re probably not buying actual fresh shrimp,
unless you live near the gulf
where most shrimping is happening here in the US,
likely what you’re receiving is thawed out frozen shrimp,
which is still fantastic,
especially if you’re looking for dinner tonight.
But long-term options,
if you’re doing some meal planning or anything like that,
the frozen route is absolutely a great way to go.
So, some key things you wanna look for in your shrimp,
you want them to be really nice and clear.
You wanna make sure the tails are translucent
and should have some pinkness to them.
Nice white, plump meat.
It’s not deteriorating or anything like that.
When buying shrimp,
they should almost always have,
one of the two certifications, ASC or MSC.
Those will really help out
in letting you know that this
is a ecologically friendly product
and it’s been taken care of
with the highest of standards.
If you don’t find those at the end of the day,
US code is always gonna be a good choice.
So, when I’m looking at these frozen shrimp here,
I’m seeing that they’re not all stuck together.
One thing you definitely wanna look for on the front
and also on the back is that there are no added chemicals.
You’ll see in ingredients,
just shrimp, which is what you want.
So, here are some red flags when looking at shrimp.
Right off the bat, the odor will tell you a lot.
If you smell something that’s off, it probably is.
They should not be slimy,
they shouldn’t be sticky.
You’ll also see on some of these that the tips
of their tails are starting to turn black.
Their legs are starting to turn,
some of their shells are turning pink.
So, these could all be indicators of temperature abuse.
One thing you can do to really see
if this has gone too far or not,
soak them in an ice water solution for 5, 10, 15 minutes.
Take one out,
crack it in half and give it a good smell.
If at that point it’s still funky,
it’s probably too far gone.
All right, let’s talk about some white fish now.
In front of me, I have some pollock,
but this goes for all general white fish.
You’re looking at cod, haddock, hake.
They’re all gonna have similar characteristics
that you’ll wanna look out for.
You’ll notice some things right off the bat,
not totally uniformly white.
There’s some pink,
there’s some color in there and super solid,
really nice structure to it.
Another thing these fish will have
is a little bit of translucency,
and that’s something that you can see usually
in a cross section.
So, white whitefish tends to be a cheaper option.
These fish are in abundance,
because of the large volume of whitefish that’s sold.
You need preservatives to get your product to market.
And so these fish sometimes can also be treated
with sodium tripolyphosphates.
Something that’ll be a key indicator
for something like that.
The fish is just bleached white.
This piece in front of me is very mealy.
You can see it’s like a peeled sweater almost.
Might be a little more rubbery in texture,
a little artificial tasting.
Another thing that we keep talking about,
and it’s very important, is the scent of this.
As fish start to break down,
they release something called trimethylamine,
which is a chemical that I think most people
who don’t like fish associate with fish.
There’s a big reason why seafood
is commonly served with acidic ingredients,
like lemon for example.
They do break down some of that harsh flavoring.
So, if you do have a piece of fish
that is getting a little funky,
but you know for a fact it’s still good,
’cause you just got it yesterday.
Get a couple lemons, limes
and make yourself a little citrus dish with it.
Now, we’re gonna look at some fish as a whole.
Here we have an American red snapper
and here we have a Spanish mackerel.
Like everything else, you want it to be nice and firm,
glossy.
It should have a really nice color to it.
It shouldn’t be fading or yellowing at all.
The eyeballs and the gills
are gonna be the two biggest factors.
You wanna look for clear eyes above everything else,
but as long as they’re nice and clear,
don’t have a yellow coat over them or anything like that,
you’re probably on the right track with the fish.
And also checking the gills.
So, things like snapper tend to come, no gills.
Generally speaking, they’re gonna be cleaned out already.
The mackerel will have gills in it.
It’s very easy to peel it back and take a look.
You want to see some color in there.
This is a very delicate organ that gets a lot of use.
So, if this is still red and vibrant,
it’s a good sign for how the rest of the fish is doing.
Could be a little smelly in there.
Normal.
I wouldn’t hold it against the fish.
When looking in the internal cavity of a whole fish
that’s already been cleaned,
usually the bloodline would be along the spine here.
You wanna make sure that’s not there
and generally cleaned out.
Also, the belly meat usually has a membrane on it,
a white membrane on most fish.
You wanna make sure that’s still intact.
Usually this area on a fish
that’s already been cleaned is going to be the first spot
where you’ll see real signs of aging.
The blood will start turning black,
you’ll start seeing yellowing,
especially up in the gill plate.
There’ll be plenty of yellow stuff in there.
You don’t want to eat the fish mustard.
You can also use their fins
as a guiding factor if they have life in them,
if they’re shiny, if they’re not super dry and cracking
and brittle like sometimes the fins tend to be.
Let’s get into some red flags when buying whole fish now.
One of the things you’re gonna wanna look out for
is blown out bellies of fish.
And this happens more often than not in softer fish
that don’t have scales.
We have a Boston mackerel here
that’s taken on quite a bit of color.
You can see some bruising around the eyes.
This fish is definitely pretty far gone,
but we’ll take a look at the insides of this guy too,
even though the outside is pretty nasty.
We actually do have some pretty nice gills on this guy.
Grilling this fish?
Sure.
Crudo?
Maybe not.
And then moving down the line, we have another snapper here,
which is probably the most far gone.
The eyes are pretty much completely clouded over,
lots of yellowing around the mouth area.
And as you open the belly,
you’ll see as well gills are still in.
Bloodline has not been taken out
and you’ll start to see the meat around the belly here
is also starting to yellow and take on some of that color.
Very strong odor coming off of this fish.
The tail is pretty brittle and dried out here.
Same thing on this mackerel
where it’s actually cracking and breaking.
You may be able to work with some of these,
but again, when searching for a really top tier hole fish,
I might skip these.
Here we have some scallops.
These are fresh sea scallops.
These are what you would call dry scallops.
All that means essentially
is that these are untreated natural scallops,
fresh shucked, no chemicals, no additives
and no preservatives.
This is like candy of the sea.
So scallops, they have a muscle fiber
that is pretty distinct and if you have a fresh one
and you kind of tear it yourself,
it should be really nice and uniform in there,
nice and tight, translucent as well.
And then smelling it.
It should have like a milky ocean smell.
Some might say it’s a strong smell,
but it’s definitely not a bad smell.
So, you’ll see here we have sort of a gradient of color.
Some of the whiter creamier scallops
are gonna be your males.
And then sometimes you see some orange,
sort of pinkish scallops.
Nothing wrong with those, those are just the females.
So here are some things to look out for
when you’re buying scallops.
These are scallops that are treated
with sodium tripolyphosphate.
They’re gonna be a bleached white color.
They’re gonna be really, really plump
and almost hard to the touch.
They’re pretty translucent.
They’re not as milky.
They just don’t have the same freshness to them
that the other ones do.
And when you rip these apart,
their muscle fibers are a little more spread apart.
There’s a little more grain and definition there.
A lot of it has to do with the soaking up of the solution
as it swells the scallop and causes it to expand.
So, do the muscle fibers.
FDA approved product, nothing wrong with this at all.
However, if you’ve ever had a scallop
that you have difficulty searing or getting color on,
maybe it’s sodium tripolyphosphate treated scallop
that has a lot of water retained,
it’s just never gonna really get that crust
that you want on it.
So, if you do buy some wet scallops
and you are concerned about sodium tripolyphosphates
and you’re trying to leach some of it out,
one really easy way to do that
is to soak the scallops in a 3% brine
and soaking those for 15, 20 minutes
is gonna leach a lot of that out.
So, coming up next,
we have some squid that we’re gonna talk about.
This is a fresh squid right here,
skin on still, guts in.
If it does have the skin on,
you wanna make sure that it’s all intact.
You can see all of the chromatophores there,
which is the things that let the squid change color
in the water.
The hood is nice and tight.
It’s not ripping off at the seams or anything like that.
You wanna be able to see those eyes.
You don’t want them to be super clouded over.
It goes bad really quickly.
So, if you’re gonna buy some fresh squid,
one of the best ways to store it is actually like this.
You want squid to be buried in ice as cold as possible,
as close to the freezing point as possible,
without actually freezing.
So, now let’s talk about some red flags
when buying fresh squid.
These are whole squid guts in
that means the squid ink is still in there as well.
Squid ink will turn to ammonia very quickly.
It will ruin your squid experience.
One of the biggest things you’re gonna look for
is the color change.
Fresh, clean squid.
You can see the undertone of it
is this nice, bright, vibrant white.
As they go, they start to turn this subtle shade of pink.
The skin can be removed,
but the actual flesh will start to inherit,
some of that color.
One of the easiest ways to spot,
whether it’s just the skin starting to go
or if the actual squid is going,
is you can just very simply just peel some of the skin away.
You could also ask your fishmonger like,
Hey, I see the squid is still dirty.
Do you mind cleaning it for me?
And take a look at how it looks when that’s done.
Choosing the freshest squid in the beginning
and then storing it properly
is gonna extend its shelf life to its maximum.
These three share quite a bit
when it comes to shopping for them,
but there are some key differences
where you really need to pay attention.
Starting with mussels.
This is a shellfish that opens and closes pretty regularly.
If you see any of these open,
usually you can just give ’em a tap,
just tap ’em with your finger
or use another one just to give ’em a little tap.
And they should close right up.
If you don’t see them closing, probably dead.
And I would 100% avoid eating a dead mussel.
All of these are filter feeders.
When they die,
the bacteria in them multiplies just exponentially
and very quickly.
Clams will open sometimes when you’re purging them.
So, say you buy a bunch of clams,
you’re putting them in some water,
getting some of that sand out.
They’ll open a little bit as they filter,
but they’ll close right back up.
Oysters on the other hand, should almost never be open.
If an oyster is open, it’s dead
and you should not eat that whatsoever.
With oysters is actually a very easy way to tell
if they’re alive or dead.
What you can do is you grab an oyster one
and just give it a tap,
and you want to hear it,
[shells smashing]
it should sound full.
So, if you hear anything sounding a little empty,
you want to be suspect of that guy.
Keeping the shellfish alive is imperative
and it’s actually pretty easy to do at home.
One thing you have to keep in mind
is that these do need oxygen.
So, sealing them in a Ziploc
or tying them off in a bag that you got,
probably not the best way to store them,
they’ll die pretty quickly.
Also, you want to keep them somewhat moist, not wet,
but in a container, breathable,
maybe a damp kitchen towel over them
in a cold part of your fridge
where they’re not getting hit with so much air.
Just the more air they get hit with the drier they become,
the quicker they die
and you’re not gonna have the time to enjoy them.
So, here’s some red flags when dealing with shellfish.
One easy way to tell that these are bad is the smell.
Mussels, some of my favorite smells in the seafood industry,
pure ocean oysters, a little briny, salt water.
Clams, they kind of have a balance where they’re sort
of milky ocean vibes.
That being said,
when they go bad, the smell is extremely strong,
especially on things like oyster.
So, if you smell anything off on a shellfish, 100%,
do not recommend eating it.
With clams, it’s not all uncommon to see cracked clams.
Some cases you might be able to get away with it.
It’s probably okay.
I don’t think it’s worth the risk.
Probably would toss this one and just move on.
Same with this guy.
And even though it’s very subtle,
you can see that this one is open.
It’s not closing.
It sounds hollow.
It will just tap it and you can hear that.
[shells smashing]
Going by smell is always a safe bet.
Give it a whiff.
You want a nice, high tide smell,
you want fresh ocean smell.
This right now,
dead clam,
low tide smell.
You wanna avoid that for sure.
Moving onto the mussel here,
you can see as well completely open.
Give it a tap.
It’s not really closing.
It shouldn’t be an instant thing,
but it should start to happen.
You can see things moving and this guy’s not moving.
So, I would just toss this.
With oysters,
generally rock solid.
I mean super, super tight.
They don’t go anywhere,
but if you’re able to move a shell around,
it’s not a good thing.
These can be really dangerous factors
when looking at shellfish.
So, definitely buy these live
and go through them when you get home.
So, here we have a beautiful example of a live lobster
and a live dungeness crab.
So, often you’ll go to the grocery store
and you’ll see a tank of live lobsters.
You wanna be really careful to see
if there are any dead lobsters in that tank.
Just because one lobster
has died doesn’t necessarily mean they’re all bad.
However, you don’t know how long it’s been dead for.
What sort of bacteria are leaching into the water
and then contaminating those live lobsters.
So, you wanna be paying special attention,
seeing that they’re taken care of, healthy,
they’re moving around.
Their tail flapping is a really, really great sign
that they’re as fresh as you can get it.
The eyeballs being nice and shiny.
They’re not sunken in or cloudy.
Still got lots of really bright, vibrant color on it.
These are all indicators that you should buy this lobster,
take it home, cook it as soon as possible and enjoy it.
So lobster and crab,
they tend to spoil rather quickly,
especially crab,
because there’s very little separation,
between the digestive enzymes
and the actual meat in and of itself.
I mean, everything is housed
in this center body of the crab here.
So, as soon as it dies, the bacteria just goes to work.
Lobster, you have a little more time on that.
They’re a little more of a complex creature.
They have a little more of a barrier
where things are tend to be stored up here in this area.
So, it’s a little separation from the tail, from the claws.
Whereas again, with the crab,
everything is here and just disperses out right away.
Lobster and crab do not have to be intimidating whatsoever.
They’re pretty simple.
Just make sure they’re alive and you’re good to go.
At the end of the day, trust your fishmonger
and ask as many questions as you possibly can ask
to hold the product, to smell the product.
The more you know, the better decision you can make.
[bright music]
