Prawn Events

Announced on Monday, April 14, at the 19th Annual Restaurant Awards, held at the Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre Hotel. (18 Apr 2008) Vancouver Magazine

18 April 2008

By Andrew Morrison

Announced on Monday, April 14, at the 19^th Annual Restaurant Awards, held at the Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre Hotel.

Over 900,000 tonnes of Tiger prawns are harvested annually, roughly two- thirds coming from warm-water farms that dot the deltas of Southeast Asia. It’s a relatively new and very profitable industry in producer nations like Vietnam, and it has badly wounded the communities that support it. Along with environmental damage have come disease, debt, and dispossession. Despite these sad facts (not to mention that the prawns often feast on antibiotics and growth hormones), the prawns remain an attractive commodity on the global market. Predictable by virtue of their blandness and cheap availability year-round, farmed Tigers will always be an easy sell. Mushy in texture and almost devoid of flavour, they remain manufactured ghosts, shadows of the real thing. (Indeed, if this were a piece on the worst ingredient of the year, farmed prawns would most certainly crack the shortlist.)

The strongest argument against them is that we have always had a superior alternative sourced by fishermen right here at home. Sweet and delicately flavoured, firm on the incisors and succulent on the molars, the B.C. spot prawn—largest of all our local prawns—is one of the finest and best-tasting crustaceans that our oceans surrender. And the fishermen use baited traps on buoy lines, keeping habitat damage and by-catch to a minimum. Supply of the spot prawn has long been ample, but local demand had been minimal. The short season, six- to eight-weeks beginning in May, made it a delicacy overseas and doomed the domestic market. Ninety percent of the catch was whisked to Asia, the remainder going to the few restaurants and markets around B.C. willing to pay a premium price. Enter the Chef’s Table Society. Last May, the local collective of conscientious food lovers, chefs, and restaurateurs helped to develop and promote Vancouver’s first day-boat spot-prawn fishery. To raise public awareness they hosted the 1st Annual Spot Prawn Festival at False Creek’s Fisherman’s Wharf. The event introduced Vancouver chefs and home cooks to the best local ingredient they’d never heard of, and ensured the spot prawn a place on our more forward-thinking menus for years to come.

2nd Annual Spot Prawn Festival: Fisherman’s Wharf, May 2. For more information visit Chefstablesociety.com

Source:  Vancouver Magazine

For Immediate Release - April 18, 2008

The Chefs’ Table Society of BC Announces the 2nd Annual Spot Prawn Festival

Mia Stainsby, Vancouver Sun
Published: Wednesday, April 23, 2008

PRAWN SPOTTING: Spot prawn season is here and nowhere is it more evident than at False Creek Fishermen’s Wharf where the Second Annual Spot Prawn Festival takes place Saturday, May 3 from noon to 5 p.m., rain or shine. Aurora Bistro, Pear Tree, Wild Rice, Diva at The Met, Vij’s, Chambar, Cru, C Restaurant, Northwest Culinary Academy, Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts, Jericho Tennis Club, Provence, Elixir Bistro and the Moustache Cafe, as well as David Hawksworth from the Georgia Hotel, will have emissary chefs on hand, cooking and serving spot prawn dishes. Go Fish, which is located on the site, will have spot prawn specials. And, for those who want to cook for themselves, fishers will be selling the sustainable seafood at the Wharf (1505 West First Ave.) for $12 a pound. Spot prawns will be available at the Wharf for six to eight weeks between 2 and 6 p.m., daily.

As well, Granville Island Public Market will be featuring spot prawn cooking demonstrations May 3, 4, and 10, at 11 a.m., 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. Chefs at the Market will be Peter Robertson of Raincity Grill, Tojo Hidekazu of Tojo’s, Frank Pabst of Blue Water Cafe, and James Walt from Araxi (Whistler). For further event information, visit www.chefstablesociety.ca.

CHEFS’ TABLE SOCIETY ANNOUNCES THE FIRST ANNUAL SPOT PRAWN FESTIVAL
Launch date: Saturday May 3rd, 12:00pm - 6:00pm
Duration: The Spot Prawn Festival will run for six to eight weeks.
Buying times: The estimated time of arrival of the boats is 4.30pm to 5.30pm every afternoon.
Location: False Creek Fishermen’ Wharf
(1505 West 1st Avenue, North-West of Granville Island, between the Burrard Street Bridge and the Granville Street Bridge - http://www.falsecreek.com/p_map.htm)

The Chefs’ Table Society of BC has announced the First Annual Spot Prawn Festival, sponsored by False Creek Fishermen’s Wharf and the Vancouver Aquarium’s Oceanwise program. Lasting for the duration of the season, the six to eight week Spot Prawn Festival will kick off on Saturday May 3rd from 12 pm to 6 pm with a community and family-friendly event at False Creek Fishermen’s Wharf.

This rain or shine launch will feature a lively cooking demonstration stage hosted by Vancouver magazine’s Jamie Maw and some of Vancouver’s top chefs. Food lovers will see delicious samples, spot prawn specials at the award-winning Go Fish!, a gathering of Vancouver’s chef and restaurant community, and the arrival of the season’s first spot prawns as local fishermen return to the wharf with their catch. The Chefs’ Table Society cooking demonstrations will take place from 1 pm to 5 pm with the following chefs preparing dishes from their own spot prawn recipes:

John Bishop Bishop’s; Gord Martin Bin 941&942 / Go Fish; David Hawksworth West; Nico Schuermans Chambar; Don Letendre Elixir; Neil Wyles Hamilton Street Grill; and Dino Renaerts Chef Consultant.

The goals of the Spot Prawn Festival are to highlight an environmentally sound and locally sourced product as a readily available and delicious alternative to Southeast Asian tiger prawns (a staggering 900,000 tonnes of which are consumed worldwide per annum, with the overwhelming majority being farmed); to help encourage the development of Vancouver’s first day-boat fishery delivering high quality spot prawns directly to the local community; and to remind us that farmer’s markets don’t stop at the water’s edge.

The annual Spot Prawn Festival will provide another local, fresh, and sustainable ingredient for our restaurant chefs and home cooks to enjoy. Those who take pride in serving the bounty of British Columbia can use this annual six to eight week window of opportunity to purchase live, locally sourced and sustainable spot prawns directly from our local fishermen at False Creek Fishermen’s Wharf for $12 per pound for the public ($10 for Chefs’ Table members). The Chefs’ Table Society encourages local chefs and restaurants to purchase spot prawns during this period, and invites the public to participate by purchasing spot prawns not just from the docks but from participating restaurants as well.

Local. Sustainable. Delicious. Join us for the 1st Annual Local Spot Prawn Festival!

Contacts:
Tiffany Soper
CTS Director of Communications
604-783-0013
tiffanysoper@shaw.ca