Quality Starts on the Water

When you buy a piece of wild sockeye salmon, I think you should know where the quality comes from.

It doesn’t start at the supermarket. It doesn’t start when the fillet is vacuum sealed. It starts with the fishermen.

Out in Bristol Bay, we take that seriously.

One of the most important things we do on the Ava Jane is bleed every fish immediately after it’s caught. The fish comes aboard, and we take care of it right away. It’s a simple step, but it makes a difference.

Much of commercial fishing today is focused on catching as many fish as possible. Quality can become an afterthought. Over the past two years, processors have eased requirements around bleeding fish, only requiring the practice during slower periods at the beginning and end of the seasons (also called the shoulders). I’ve never believed it should be that way. 

All of the fish we sell is from mandatory bleeding periods. Immediately bleeding a fish is an important step in preserving the overall quality, including texture, flavor, and appearance. 

The fish you eat at your table is only as good as the way it was treated when it was caught.

That’s something I’ve believed for a long time. You can’t make up for poor handling later. If you want a great piece of salmon on your plate, you have to start with a great fish and treat it right from the beginning.

Once our sockeye leaves the boat, we continue that same focus on quality. Every fillet goes through a grading process before it is either cut into portions or vacuum sealed as a whole fillet. We’re looking at the fish and making sure it meets our standards before it makes its way into a package.

Then our processor flash freezes it.

For us, flash freezing is about more than extending the shelf life of the fish. It’s about locking in the quality at its peak. Our sockeye is handled and frozen while it is still at its best, preserving the flavor, texture, and quality of the fish we worked so hard to bring home. 

Our sockeye fillets and portions are only frozen once. We will never sell you twice-frozen sockeye salmon. A lot of the product on the market is frozen whole, then thawed, filleted, and frozen again; not at Wild for Salmon. The goal is to preserve what we worked so hard to protect on the boat: the quality of wild Bristol Bay sockeye.

For me, this is about more than selling salmon. I spend my summer fishing for these fish because I believe in what they are. Wild sockeye from Bristol Bay is an incredible resource, and when we bring it home, I want our customers to experience it as close as possible to the quality it had when it came out of the water.

That means paying attention to the details.

Bleeding the fish immediately. Handling it carefully. Keeping it cold. Flash freezing it at peak quality. Grading every fillet. And making sure the fish that leaves our facility is something I’d be proud to put on my own table.

We may not be able to grow into a huge company or always have product in stock, but we will always have the best Bristol Bay sockeye salmon on the market. 

From the water in Bristol Bay to your table, quality starts with how you handle the catch.

— Captain Steve Kurian, F/V Ava Jane

Taste the quality of our wild Sockeye salmon yourself.