Fishy business

Early this morning I visited the fish auction at the United Fishing Agency at the end of Pier 38 in Honolulu. We stood out on the pier and watched over a working fishing vessel as John, a representative of Hawaii Seafood, told us about the start of the auctions in the1950s and walked us through the importance of line fishing (the technique used to catch the high quality fish in the markets).

Every morning, each fishing boat sets out a line with 2,500 - 3,000 hooks. These lines extend from 50 - 350m below the water's surface and catch a range of fish, from younger fish and species such as Mahi-Mahi in the shallower, warmer waters, to the larger, older (and more valuable) big eye tuna in the ocean's depths.

There are 3 factors that contribute to tuna quality - color, which should be a deep, translucent red and is found in more mature tuna; texture, which you want to be firm, rather than soft; and fat content, which you want to be high and oily as this gives the most flavour. Line fishing also helps fish quality as the fish are less stressed than when netted.

The bell rang and the auction started! We headed through the plastic curtains into the chilled room filled with rows of fish laid out on the wet concrete floor.  There were glistening and fat big eye tuna (which the Hawaiians call Ahi), mahimahi with their large foreheads, pale slabs of swordfish, striped marlin, hula-hoop sized moonfish and white fleshed Walu that you should only eat in small quantities!

A small group of 15 buyers, all wearing brown plastic gumboots, clustered around each fish, expertly running the small sample cut from the fish's back flank through their fingers. The bidding started high, at around $12/lb and descended, with a bidder chipping in when a reasonable price was reached. It looked like the best pieces were going for around $9/lb, with the bigger big eye tuna around 85lb. That's some expensive fish!