December 16, 2024Make Virginia Seafood Part of Your Holiday Meals!
With the holiday season being such a busy time of the year it can be difficult to decide on what to prepare for your family this year. The VMPB would like to help with this choice by suggesting Virginia Seafood. Thanks to Virginia’s unique location in the Chesapeake Bay region as well as being on the Atlantic Coast, Virginia commercial watermen and women have a wide variety of species to harvest year-round.
Some of Virginia’s most popular seafood offerings include one of the Chesapeake Bays most famous resident, the Blue Crab. Blue Crab has a sweet taste and can be served in a variety of ways including steamed, in soups, chowders, or bisques, and can also be fried and eaten in the softshell. Scallops caught off Virginia’s Atlantic Coast are another delicious choice. Scallops are very tender with a taste similar to steak and are served well fried, seared, or broiled. Wild Blue Catfish is a delicious sustainable option. Blue Catfish feed in the water column so they have a sweet taste and firm fillets to adhere to a variety of different sauces, spices, and cooking methods. Virginia also has a wide variety of other finfish including but not limited to Striped Bass and Flounder which are both delicious fried, pan seared, and broiled.
Virginia also has a substantial and continuously growing Aquaculture industry for Oysters and Clams. Virginia leads the East Coast in Oyster production and the entire nation in Clam production. Oysters can be served in a variety of ways including fried, roasted, in stews or served raw. Clams can also be served raw, roasted, in chowders, and steamed. Both Clams and Oysters are filter feeders that help improve water quality in the Chesapeake Bay by removing harmful nutrients. We would like to thank Virginia’s commercial watermen, women and Aquaculture growers for providing us with fresh and local seafood year-round. Follow this link to see the VMPB’s list of delicious seafood recipes to try and follow this link if you are interested in seeing our seafood retailer’s directory.