NEWSLINE : July 1999

SUPPLY
Escolar, the trendy "new" fish
This unique fish is showing up on menus and in display cases

By Fiona Robinson

Barry Cohan started selling escolar on a limited basis almost 10 years ago to satisfy a few customers in California.

Nowadays, the seafood wholesaler sells almost 2 tons of the finfish each week to a growing number of retail and foodservice accounts.

Cohan, president of Cohan Seafood Co. in San Francisco, says his customers are drawn to the fish, which has a rich taste similar to Chilean sea bass, sablefish and lingcod.

Escolar (Lepidocybium flavobrunneum) was once thought to belong to the Scrombriod family of tuna and mackerel; its dark, torpedo-shaped body looks a lot like that of an albacore tuna. The fish is harvested from the Gulf of Mexico and South Pacific.

Buyers are searching out escolar for its flavor and price; the fish wholesales for approximately $2.25 per pound.

In fact, seafood buyers who balk at the price of Chilean sea bass are fast learning that escolar is a good substitute, says Walter Compare, owner of Hanson Bros. Seafood in Portland, Maine.

“The texture is firm and rich; it really has a unique flavor — it’s really good,” says Compare.

Hanson Bros. sells several hundred pounds of escolar a week from its retail operation at the Portland Public Market, and Compare says more and more of his customers these days are asking for the trendy fish.

But escolar comes with an important caveat to which Compare and others alert their customers: The fish’s high oil content creates a laxative effect when eaten in large quantities.

Purveyours recommend quality over quantity; portion sizes should be about 6 ounces, they advise.

In fact, in 1992 the FDA advised suppliers not to sell escolar because of its “purgative qualities.”

Cohan Seafood was one company that was told to discontinue selling the fish, despite the increasing demand for it.

But, in 1994, the FDA backed off its stance and allowed companies to sell the fish again, ultimately because there was no clear law against selling it, says Cohan.

Since then, he reports, his escolar sales have been growing.

“Any stories I’ve heard are hearsay,” says Cohan. “I have yet to really have someone say, ‘Yeah, my customer ate it and had a horrible time with it.’”