Food Rebel: Paul Greenberg

 

 

Occupation Author of Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food and American Catch: the Fight for Our Local Seafood Location New York City, NY Favorite Food Tuna Rebel Story My dad encouraged me very early on to start writing about fishing, and so the very first thing that I ever published, was at 16 years old, and I wrote an article about fishing for Bonito and False Albacore off of Martha’s Vineyard, which is where we used to go on vacation. So I wrote it, and I sent it in, and it got published, and I got paid 60 dollars, and I was thrilled. After that I wrote a couple more articles for them, and it always stayed in my mind to write, and that’s what I’ve been doing ever since, more or less. What is the problem with fish in America today? The biggest problem with fish in America as I can see it, is that anywhere from 80-91% of the fish that we eat is imported. If you were to just look at it as from a food security issue, that’s a very insecure food position to be in. “Why is so much of our fish imported?” is a really, really complicated question. What is the solution? I think we want to design a diverse fleet, we want to invest more money as a nation into fisheries management. Understand that this is a very valuable product, and that we can really benefit economically if we spread the wealth a little bit more. As consumers, a big way to deal with this is to really diversify our palate. What is your earliest food memory? I worked on the farm, and then worked in their butcher shop. I was responsible for slicing the meat, and never, ever, would I have ever tried tongue, but sometimes the customers would come in, and I would slice the tongue. They had this smoked tongue, and it was this smoked organic beef tongue, it looked so weird; you looked at it, and it’s like all this weird texture and stuff, but it was one of the most delicious things I’ve ever had. It was the first time I really tasted the difference between, what would become organic beef, and industrial beef.