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| Seafood Road Show in Barrow Park |
Wild Oceans has been travelling about the county this summer, taking the tasting road show out and about to get everyone excited about edible ocean delights! With a variety of help, we have managed to get thousands of people to try something different, support local seafood and therefore local business. We have been to Whitehaven, Bassenthwaite, Braithwaite, St Bees, Muncaster, Newby Bridge and Barrow to name but a few, with a variety of support from the aquariums, restaurants, venues and local business people. Each event has involved food (which I find to be a fantastic encouragement for getting people interested in what you have to say!) From miniature nibblets in marquees, to 5 course taster luncheons, many people have now been encouraged to consider our thoughts and ideas on how to get local seafood a market in the county to support our local industry and remove the miles from our seafood.
The major issues faced in the county involve a lack of market for day to day catches, unsustainable catch methods from some local, and many foreign or non local boats, and consumer culture and lack of diversity in our diets. The Wild Oceans project is designed to instigate change to reduce the impact of these issues. The events have been a huge success so far;
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| Course & lunch with Food & Company |
The 5 course taster menu at The Cottage in the Wood was designed to bring together people from around the county with some influence over serving more sustainable seafood from the county, in the county. All the food was locally sourced, and discussion was instigated to form relationships and share ideas. Time spent at the Aquarium of the Lakes took advantage of the venue to inspire people (with free food of course) to think more carefully about their seafood choices, which is a method that has been rolled out to many other events and venues resulting in a high level of contact with the public. Talk and taster events and courses on how to deal with seafood have opened up a forum for questions and enabled people to remove some of the unknown about dealing with fresh, local seafood rather than frozen breaded ‘fish’ from goodness knows where.
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| Beached Art 2012 - St Bees Beach |
The summer has concluded with a mega marine beach event at St Bees beach on the west coast of Cumbria, with a whole host of marine activities and events aimed to encourage awareness and create an interesting learning environment. The seafood road show was on tour, providing local coley, crab, kipper and sea bass for all to try. We also had a representative from the local industry, Esk Valley Seafoods, with a whole host of local seafood, ready to answer questions and shed some light on buying local, fresh seafood.
The success of summer has made all the work of Wild Oceans worthwhile, and hopefully there will be opportunity to roll out similar events and activities nation wide to really spread the messages that will help the UK be sustainable pioneers, retain an age old industry and make our seas last a few more lifetimes at least.
