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Coldwater shrimp

There will be plenty of cooked and peeled coldwater meat, but don’t count on supplies of the smaller sizes

There have been some pretty good buys on seafood lately, and one of the best has been coldwater shrimp. Found throughout the North Atlantic from Norway to New England and along the West Coast from northern California to Alaska, these little pink shrimp have been available lately for less than $2 a pound in the smaller sizes.

Two bucks a pound for shrimp is cheap, especially when you take into consideration the fact that it’s for cooked and peeled meats — a 100 percent usable product.

“Coldwater shrimp has been a great buy,” says the buyer for a large West Coast supermarket chain. “It’s really helped our seafood program.”

Coldwater shrimp prices have been about $1 a pound less than just a few years ago because of bumper catches of Pandalus borealis in Canada, especially Newfoundland.

After cod crashed in the early 1990s, Newfoundland fishermen started looking for alternatives, and lo and behold, they found shrimp. Lots of shrimp, which were apparently thriving in the absence of their natural predator.

“The small communities in Newfoundland were in desperate shape, and shrimp and crab have saved them,” says the head of the province’s seafood-marketing council.

In 1990, Newfoundland fishermen caught less than 20,000 metric tons of shrimp, but by last year their catch had ballooned to more than 80,000 metric tons. Together with landings from the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Atlantic Canada’s total catch of coldwater shrimp came in at a record 126,000 metric tons, by far the largest in the North Atlantic and almost twice as much as Greenland and Norway, the two other major producers.

The expansion of the Newfoundland shrimp fishery can be largely attributed to the use of a gear modification developed by the Norwegian industry that made it possible to catch shrimp without catching groundfish. Called the “Nordmore grate,” this device is a rigid grate in the net that allows groundfish to escape through an opening at the top of the net.

In the Gulf of Maine, coldwater shrimp are fished by U.S. fishermen in the winter. This fishery, which dates back to the 1930s, has produced landings of almost 10,000 metric tons as recently as 1996. In recent years, though, landings have been significantly lower. According to fishery biologists, on a long-term basis, the U.S. fishery should be able to produce about 5,000 metric tons.

Although not nearly as large a resource as in the North Atlantic, coldwater shrimp are also caught off the West Coast of North America. Pandalus jordani is a smaller species that yields cooked and peeled meats of mostly 250 count and smaller. Coldwater shrimp is one of the major species processed by the West Coast seafood industry. In a good year, coldwater shrimp catches off the United States can exceed 20,000 metric tons.

British Columbia’s small coldwater shrimp fishery off the west coast of Vancouver Island yields catches of both P. borealis and P. jordani. While this fishery has produced landings as high as 7,500 metric tons, in most years the catch is about 2,000 metric tons.

Until the late 1970s, Alaska had a very large coldwater shrimp fishery for P. borealis. Developed in the 1960s after the introduction of mechanical peelers, the Alaska fishery peaked in 1976, when almost 60,000 metric tons were landed, almost all of it from grounds near Kodiak Island and the Alaska Peninsula. A collapse of shrimp stocks in the early 1980s has kept this fishery closed.

Southeast Alaska, though, still has a small fishery for P. borealis that produces landings between 500 and 1,000 metric tons a year.

While P. borealis and P. jordani account for the lion’s share of coldwater shrimp production, there are many other species of coldwater shrimp, some of which support small fisheries. Off the West Coast of North America, for example, almost 100 species of coldwater shrimp are found from Puget Sound in Washington state to Prince William Sound in Alaska.

Some of these shrimp can grow to a relatively large size, and they are highly sought after, especially in Asian markets, where they are often eaten raw (coldwater shrimp are the only shrimp sushi bars serve raw).

The largest of these fisheries targets spot shrimp, Pandalopsis platyceros, which is fished by trap off British Columbia and Southeast Alaska. In recent years, landings of spot shrimp have been about 2,000 metric tons, about 75 percent of which is landed by B.C. fishermen. The spot shrimp season in British Columbia opens May 1 and usually lasts until early July.

In Alaska, the season opens Oct. 1 and most of the catch is taken within three or four weeks. Most fishermen freeze their shrimp whole immediately after catching it or sell it live to Chinese restaurants in Vancouver, British Columbia, or Seattle.

While the low prices for cooked and peeled meats have been a boon for distributors and end users, it’s been hard to swallow for fishermen.

On the West Coast, after receiving just 25 cents (U.S.) a pound for their shrimp this summer, fishermen hired a law firm in September to investigate whether they have a legitimate dumping claim against the Canadians. It may be a hard case to prove, since Newfoundland fishermen refused to go fishing this summer, saying it simply wasn’t worth it, given the extremely low prices.

After meeting with processors in late June, Newfoundland fishermen decided they would stop fishing the first week in July until they saw an improvement in the market and better prices from processors. Finally, in September, Newfoundland processors reluctantly agreed to bump the ex-vessel price of large shrimp up a nickel, to 47 cents, and fishermen went fishing again.

The idling of summer shrimp plants was also hard on Canadian shrimp processors, who invested more than $100 million (Canadian) in new peelers and processing lines over the past few years.

Although the weather was still fine in early October, it remains to be seen whether or not Newfoundland fishermen will be able to catch their full inshore quota before the weather deteriorates and small-boat fishermen haul out for the winter.

Supply outlook

While there will be plenty of cooked and peeled coldwater shrimp meat available, there probably won’t be as much around as last year, especially in the smaller sizes.

This summer’s tie-up in Newfoundland is expected to make it hard for fishermen there to land the inshore quota before the weather forces them to call it quits. By early October, they had landed 30,000 metric tons out of an inshore quota that was approximately 50,000 metric tons. According to one fisheries manager in St. John’s, it’s likely that Newfoundland inshore fishermen will leave about 20 percent of their quota in the water this year.

But even if Newfoundland inshore boats don’t catch their full quota, Canadians will still catch a lot of coldwater shrimp this year.

About half of the 126,000 metric tons of coldwater shrimp caught by Canadian fishermen last year was landed by inshore fishermen from Newfoundland. The rest was caught by fishermen from Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Quebec — who fish the waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence —and by offshore factory trawlers that fish the Davis Strait between Labrador and Greenland year-round.

Production from the factory trawlers is frozen whole and exported to markets in Asia and Europe.

Look for imports of Canadian shrimp meat to be off by about 10 to 20 percent from last year’s record of about 6,000 metric tons.

The surge in Canadian shrimp production has reduced the flow of U.S. imports of coldwater shrimp from other countries to a trickle. Combined imports from Norway, Iceland and Greenland, for example, totaled less than 150 metric tons in 2000. As long as Canadian shrimp stocks remain strong, which is considered likely, imports of coldwater shrimp from other North Atlantic countries should be minimal.

Fishing off Norway has been poor this summer, as catches were running about 35 percent below last year’s 65,000 metric tons. Production from Greenland could also be down this year, due to price disputes between the country’s largest processor and fishermen.

On the West Coast, where coldwater shrimp are fished from April to October, fishermen had caught 13,000 metric tons of shrimp by the first week in October. By the time the fishery closes, catches should be close to last year’s haul of 15,000 metric tons.

The winter shrimp fishery in the Gulf of Maine was disappointing, and most fishermen stopped fishing shrimp when processors dropped the price to 75 cents a pound in March. Look for New England shrimp landings to be below last year’s lean catch of about 2,500 metric tons.

Price trends

If you were waiting until this fall to book container loads of small cooked and peeled shrimp at $2 a pound, you missed the boat. This summer’s tie-up in Newfoundland and the West Coast processors’ ability to push a lot of fresh shrimp through retail channels have tightened the market considerably.

After falling from $2.80 a pound in January, the average price of 250- to 350-count Canadian meats to distributors fell to $2.10 in July, when Newfoundland fishermen stopped fishing. By late August, with Newfoundland inshore boats still not fishing, West Coast processors had raised their price to distributors from $1.85 to $2.15 a pound for 350-count product.

In late September, even though Newfoundland boats were fishing again, West Coast processors told their customers to stock up, because they were anticipating another price increase of at least 25 cents a pound by the end of November. Once West Coast processors bumped their price, Canadian suppliers quickly followed suit.

Prices for the larger 125/175 sizes of Canadian shrimp also declined from a high of about $3.45 a pound at the beginning of the year to a low of $3.05 a pound by late summer, then rebounded to $3.50 in October.

Prices of whole cooked P. borealis also increased, due primarily to lower production from Norway and Greenland this year. In late September, the price of whole-cooked, sea-frozen shrimp was running $1 to $1.50 a pound, f.o.b.  Europe, depending on size.

The price of raw whole spot prawns has softened slightly due to weak conditions in Japan. Prices still run $10 and up for the larger sizes.

Look for more upward pressure on coldwater shrimp prices through the winter. West Coast processors sold a lot of their production fresh, so inventories are much lower than they were last fall. That, coupled with lower North Atlantic production, could send the size of small cooked and peeled meats closer to typical levels of $2.50 to $3 a pound by the time fishing starts next spring. 

Buying tips

There are big differences in the quality — and the price — of coldwater shrimp. The best coldwater shrimp are caught off the east coast of Greenland and frozen whole raw, and cost about the same as smaller cooked and peeled meat.

The difference is in the flavor. The best coldwater shrimp have a unique sweet taste, whether they’re raw or cooked. When it comes to quality, most buyers give the nod to the North Atlantic coldwater shrimp meat over the cooked and peeled product produced on the West Coast. The bigger sizes also tend to have more flavor and a more attractive red meat color, say knowledgeable buyers.

If you want to buy cooked and peeled shrimp from West Coast processors, you may want to take the time to learn which plant your shrimp was packed in, as quality can vary. Some plants use nitrogen freezers, which produces a better product.

The use of tripoly is standard practice among coldwater shrimp processors, who soak shrimp in a 3.5 to 5 percent solution because it makes the shrimp easier to peel after they’re cooked.

More West Coast retailers have been pushing fresh coldwater shrimp in the summer. Be aware that most processors sell their fresh shrimp meat ungraded. As a result, you may end up with smaller shrimp than you wanted, as some processors will high-grade their production and freeze the larger meats.

Still, consumers seem to prefer fresh meats. One large retailer says his coldwater shrimp sales jump 20 percent when he switches to fresh product.

Since cooked and peeled coldwater shrimp meat is almost always sold IQF, it’s almost always glazed. Make sure you buy based on net weight, and don’t forget to conduct glaze tests from time to time.

The best time to get good buys on coldwater shrimp is normally in the summer, when landings are at their seasonal peak and processors are motivated to move inventory and generate cash flow — even at the expense of making money. Prices normally firm up in the fall after fishing ends and processors focus on selling their product at a profit.

Culinary notes

The culinary rule of thumb on coldwater shrimp meat is that it’s great for cold applications such as salads and sandwiches, but it doesn’t adapt well to cooked applications.

And coldwater shrimp meat is great served cold. It’s an excellent way to add value to salads. Or serve coldwater shrimp in a shrimp cocktail, but instead of smothering them with cocktail sauce, try serving them with some grapefruit slices and a zesty mustard-mayonnaise sauce.

But coldwater shrimp meat can work well in warm dishes. The trick is to understand that they’re already cooked, so they need to be added to a hot dish at the last minute, just in time to absorb some flavor and heat up.

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