the KIng of crabs
It took three plane rides in just under forty-eight hours, a fifty-five minute journey out to the depths of the Barents Sea in a lifeboat, and then an hour tossing in a small fishing boat at temperatures of minus five. But as the sun went down at 3pm somewhere to the east of Murmansk, Pascal Proyart, Head Chef at One O One Knightsbridge, finally caught crabs.
Pascal loves these crabs, so much so that they feature heavily on the menu at his restaurant. Looking at the evil buggers as they scuttle and clatter around the bottom of the boat, angry as hell at being brought up from the depths of the sea, it’s hard to see why. They are enormous, rather like dustbin lids with legs, and they have fearsome expressions when viewed close. Only the very biggest ones, over twenty years old, will end up in the pot though. The Norwegians are strict about controlled and sustainable fishing, but at the high prices the Red King Crabs fetch at the local processing factory the boat owners (the boats can not be longer than 20 meters, and can not use more than 30 pots.) can afford to lob the small ones back in. They get a fat payday with just a few beauties delivered to shore and the Japanese, amongst others, sending boats to collect the crabs from the processing plants to whisk back to Tokyo tables.
So what makes them so sought after? For Pascal it’s the incomparable taste and texture. Each crab matures incredibly slowly at the cold temperatures in the Berents Sea and it does so in water that’s gin clear and free from pollutants. The body is discarded, it’s the legs that are the meat of the matter, so large they are like lobster tails. Pascal does wonderful things with them in his kitchen and his advocacy of this unique and sustainable luxury food has led him to work closely with the Norwegian Seafood Export Council to fly the flag for their product in London.
This seems a good time to tell you more about the Red King Crab. It was actually introduced into the Barent’s Sea by Russian researchers in the 1960s. They brought it by train from its home in the Sea of Ohotsk, no doubt in a plastic bag like a fairground goldfish, and the idea was to give the Murmansk citizens something to make money from. No one reckoned on how the crab would take so happily to its new home, though. It spread like a virus, chomping its way east and west at a rate of knots. Today the Norwegians and the Russians jointly manage the fishing and are keen to keep the crab from dispersing to new areas. Next year, outside a fixed zone, a free for all will be declared so that the sheer volume of crabs caught at any size or sex will have the effect of stopping the crabs spreading out further from the Southern Berents Sea.
We ourselves have flown to Tromso as our first stop in the far north of Norway, after first changing planes in Oslo, to begin our journey to the crab grounds off Kirkenes the next evening. Tromso is an island within the Arctic Circle at the same latitude as Alaska and Siberia, and is home to the world’s northernmost university, brewery and cathedral. Half the year the sun never goes down at all, whilst the other half of the time it lies in almost perpetual darkness. We’re here between the two periods; the sun rises sharply at about 8am and goes down just as briskly at 3pm, leaving your body clock confused and concerned. During the months of midnight sun the area is a mecca for healthy outdoor pursuits and over 10,000 students attend the university. Right now it’s cold, very cold, but the cosy coloured wooden houses are warm inside thanks to the Norwegian enlightened energy management system which draws green electricity from Hydro Electric dams nearby and then conserves and enhances the heat generated through state of the art heat exchangers. In fact, I was told, so efficient are the heat exchangers that they almost put out more energy than they receive in.
That evening after checking in at the modern Rica Ishavshotel Tromso, we eat a fine meal in Tromso’s premier restaurant Emma’s Dream Kitchen (it was her dream to run a restaurant you see). A small place of just 30 covers and staggered over numerous floors it makes the most of the local produce and here, for most of us, was our first taste of the King Crab.
The next day, those of us who had laughed at the idea of thermal long johns weren’t laughing anymore. It was b**tard cold on the harbour wharf but the coach was cosy and we progressed through the remarkable series of underwater tunnels, hewn out seemingly by hand, which connect the islands until arriving at a fish farm where we were to be subjected to death by PowerPoint on the subject of sustainability. I jest. Actually the facts and figures about what the world is doing to fish stocks were quite salutary and food for thought. Quite simply, unless we all start to think seriously, as seriously as the Norwegians, together with the Russians already are, there won’t be affordable fish on our plates much longer. Norway exports fish to over 160 countries and the seafood industry is the country’s second largest source of income so they have every reason to be concerned.
Down below the station we were shown the process of fish farming, from single egg to fish large enough to be taken out to the deep-water station where they are grown on to full maturity and table. Here at the lab the quantity is small, but the idea is to refine and explore the process to such a degree that it can be used on an industrial scale. They farm cod, wolffish ( even uglier than monkfish), salmon, halibut and, to explore its lifestyle, the King Crab.
We changed on the shore into survival suits, which involved people staggering about like drunks trying to put them on, and then took a chilly ride in a Zodiac rubber rescue boat to the deep-water lab. This being about 2pm the sun was dying fast but making a stunning sunset out behind the frozen mountains as the low boat bounded at 45mph across the calm water. Fall in here and even with a survival suit you have about two minutes before it’s too late. Something to ponder as the Zodiac’s captain playfully sashayed and slalomed about and we all hung onto the slippery rubber sides with grips of steel.
Out on the floating man made island that is the fish lab, we saw the large open air tanks. The cod are particularly impressive, these boys and girls get to be massive if treated right, up to a metre and a half, which is a lot of fish and chips.
The next morning after a midnight flight in a turboprop ‘taxi’ to Kirkenes, we’re squashed into the hi-tech cabin of the local lifeboat (capable of rolling right over, coming up and carrying cheerfully on, we’re reassuringly informed) and chugging out into the Barents Sea to meet up with the small boats that fish for the crabs with baited cages. On the way we are regaled with stories of endangered or rare wildlife by a local expert. All his stories seem to end with ‘and then we shot it’, which is a bit worrying, as is the fact that he is wearing brown leather trousers. Pascal’s restaurant manager doesn’t mind any of it himself; he’s outside in the air busy being seasick and getting frozen simultaneously.
And there, lost in the arctic vastness (sic) is the boat and, after a scary jump across the gunwales, we’re out of the unsinkable lifeboat and onto what looks like a very sinkable crab boat. This is equipped with a winch for the crab cage and a small UHF radio and that seems to be the technological limit, but no one cares as crabs begin spilling from each cage and the scuppers fill up with clattering crabs some of them up to 20 kilos in weight and a metre across leg tip to leg tip.
Pascal poses for photos while the fishermen, who actually did all the work, look on benignly. A quick sort through the catch to sort the eatable from the illegal and the plucky ship chugs off to Bugoynes the site of the King Crab processing plant and lunch. Here the locals have prepared a small but tasty meal, but Pascal can’t help himself. He invades their small kitchen and starts cooking crab fresh from, well fresh from the processing factory over the way actually, the ones we caught have been fed into the system. After lunch we crunch our way to the factory where DM Fresh and Frozen Seafood has their base. The crabs are kept alive and well in tanks of fresh water and several thousand at a time so that supply can meet demand.
The crabs once humanely killed are separated into their component parts; legs, shoulders etc, and are either swiftly frozen raw and glazed for shipping or cooked and then frozen. Either way the process is state of the art and each stage meets stringent quality control standards. It’s not the nicest environment to work in, it's cold and wet and slippery, but the opportunities for employment in this village are few and this is well paid work just yards from the houses. As we drive back through the now familiar 3pm darkness dozing fitfully in the welcome warmth it seems that the wily Norwegians have things well worked out; jobs for all if they want them in an industry that is forward-looking and sustainable and about as eco-friendly as can be.
Later that night in a restaurant that is nothing more than a wooden hut surrounded by thick snow and with an open fire in the middle, Pascal parboils then griddles some more crabs. Delicious. This is a luxury we can afford and, with our Eco hats on, the planet too.
Pascal Proyart and his crabs can be found at One O One in Knightsbridge
Words & Pictures: Nick Harman
