Newsroom

Charles Clover Oct 16th 2009

A quarter of the country’s most critically-acclaimed restaurants are serving fish as endangered as the giant panda, according to the first survey by a new web-based guide.

The survey of restaurants in Britain to look at whether they are serving fish caught from healthy populations also found that nearly 9 out of 10 were serving at least one “fish to avoid” from overexploited stocks.

A number of Michelin-starred restaurants, seen as leaders and opinion formers in the culinary arts, were among the worst offenders in the survey of more than 100 top restaurants.

The survey was compiled by makers of the documentary film, The End of the Line, about global over-fishing, which has its TV premiere on More4 on Tuesday, October 20 at 10pm.

Among its findings were that seven out of 25 Michelin-star restaurants in the survey served species officially listed as endangered on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Red List.

The offending species was most frequently Atlantic halibut but the worst restaurants in the survey served caviar and bluefin tuna.

Some 22 Michelin restaurants served one or more species from the “fish to avoid list,” drawn up from overfished stocks by the Marine Conservation Society and based on official EU scientific advice.  This list includes European eel, cod from the North Sea and certain populations of plaice.

Overall out of 25 Michelin-starred restaurants, 11 were given red fish skeletons indicating that they served or appeared to serve endangered or overfished species, compared with 14 who won blue fish for sourcing sustainably.

The one Chinese restaurant in the survey, the Yang Sing in Manchester, received two red fish skeletons for serving shark’s fin soup.

The best establishments in the survey, which won accolades for taking trouble to avoid serving fish from overfished stocks, were the Michelin-starred West End restaurant Hibiscus and the country-wide chain of Loch Fyne restaurants.

There was a great gulf between the restaurants which earn five red fish – the worst rating for sustainability – and those who earn the top ranking of 3.5 blue fish.

The restaurants which did poorly in the survey were awarded up to five red skeleton fish.

Among the Top 10 worst restaurants for sustainability is the Michelin-starred Nobu, Berkeley St, W1, which serves bluefin tuna, now recognised by scientists as on the brink of commercial extinction because of rampant illegal fishing and the setting of quotas in excess of scientific advice.

The chain founded by Nobu Matsuhisa, whose business partner is Robert De Niro, has become world famous by cultivating celebrities.  Since it was targeted by The End of the Line Nobu has served the critically endangered bluefin with a warning to customers to choose an alternative fish.

A spokesman for Nobu said: “We take the issue of bluefin tuna and its environmentally threatened status very seriously.  It is a cultural delicacy in Japan and there is still enormous demand for it.

“A statement on the menus at our London restaurants, which informs diners that the tuna served is bluefin, was included at the behest of Greenpeace, with whom we have a continual dialogue.  We are also currently looking at Australian farm-raised tuna as an alternative.”

Cocoon, a Pan Asian restaurant in London’s West End, had bluefin on the menu throughout the time of the survey but, after receiving a questionnaire from fish2fork.com, claimed that it had now been taken off the menu.

Simon Radley at the Chester Grosvenor, which under different names has been awarded a Michelin star 19 years in succession, also receives five skeletons, and was marked down for offering Sevruga caviar from the endangered stellate sturgeon.

Mr Radley said he had now switched to sustainable caviar, but had mistakenly continued to use the Sevruga description on menus. He said he was conscious of the sustainability argument.

The Seafood Restaurant in Padstow, part-owned by Rick Stein, the TV seafood chef, rates as half a red star in the survey – indicating that the restaurant does not fully subscribe to sustainable practices – despite Stein’s public commitment to sourcing local fish from small boats and cooking unusual species to take the pressure off vulnerable stocks such as cod.

Several species on his menu were on the “fish to avoid” list menu including halibut, wild salmon, turbot and Dover sole.  The restaurant declined or failed to fill in our questionnaire.

Some of the most illustrious chefs in the country achieved very low scores for sustainability despite their Michelin stars.  The Capital Hotel in Knightsbridge, which has two stars, was awarded three red fish skeletons as was Alain Ducasse at the Dorchester, who has two Michelin stars, rising three.

The Atlantic halibut, which ranks as endangered on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Red List, was the most common reason for a restaurant to receive a low score. Most restaurants fail to disclose on their online menus whether the halibut they serve is wild or farmed.

By contrast some Michelin star holders clearly took trouble to avoid troubled stocks. Michel Roux, who runs the two Michelin starred Le Gavroche, was awarded 1.5 blue fish for choosing largely sustainable seafood as was Gordon Ramsay’s eponymous restaurant in Chelsea.

The two restaurants which came top for sustainability made a point of serving less-pressured species and were clear about the provenance of the food they served.  Hibiscus, which is run by Claude Bosi, served less pressurised species such as pollack.

Loch Fyne, a 49-restaurant chain which began as an oyster-growing business and now has outlets all over the UK and Ireland, was praised for its excellent online information about the food it served and policies of serving Icelandic cod, North Sea haddock, organically-farmed salmon and hand-dived shellfish.

Charles Clover, editor of the guide and author of the book, The End of the Line, said: “Some restaurants still have not grasped that sustainability is now part of the definition of good food.  You don’t want to eat a wonderful meal and have nightmares about the species you have pushed a little further towards extinction.

“This new guide shows the wonderful work some chefs and proprietors are doing with fishermen to make sure that they source fish of the highest quality caught in the most selective ways. It also shows the awful dark side of gastronomy, chefs who place an ephemeral taste, for which they can charge the Earth, above the survival of whole species and ecosystems.

“What few people know is that the supermarkets have made huge strides in recent years to get endangered fish off their shelves.  The trouble is, they remain on the menu at white tablecloth restaurants who haven’t yet had the searchlight of public opinion directed at the dark corners of their menus, where there are some real horror stories.”

Willie Mackenzie, oceans campaigner for Greenpeace UK said:  “As consumers we all have an impact on the oceans every time we eat a forkful of fish. We can make a real difference by what we buy, and we need to hold the retailers and restaurateurs to account for their fish sourcing policies. If we want to eat fish in years to come, then we have to radically overhaul the way we are fishing today – and your fork is the front line.”

Sam Wilding, the Marine Conservation Society’s fisheries officer, said: “It is encouraging to see Fish2fork highlighting the issue of seafood sustainability to restaurants and chefs, and giving the concerned consumer a voice. MCS provides consumers with free advice on seafood sustainability, through our pocket good fish guides and fishonline.org and is pleased to see our advice incorporated into the Fish2Fork campaign, enabling consumers to encourage sustainable seafood sourcing in their favourite restaurants.

“Because it can be a challenge for restaurants to source their seafood sustainably, the work of initiatives like Good Catch, of which MCS is a part, is vital, as it provides practical information to chefs and restaurateurs on how to responsibly buy and serve seafood, ensuring conscientious consumers keep coming back for more!”

The new interactive restaurant guide www.fish2fork.com invites the public to rate restaurants they know, good and bad, for sustainability as well as for ambience and food.  For its launch it checked the online menus of 100 mostly seafood restaurants across the UK and asked them to fill in a questionnaire about their fish sourcing policies.

Researchers used the IUCN Red List and the Marine Conservation Society list of “Fish to Avoid” as a guide to the fish that conservationists believe should not be on the menu.

Restaurants were also asked about their commitment to selling fish and shellfish caught by the least-damaging method and whether they would support a boat-to plate scheme which would allow the full traceability of the fish.

They would then be scored and given a rating for the information they provided as well as sustainability – with red stars for those who performed poorly and blue for those who performed well.

The End of the Line will be shown in More4’s True Stories on Tuesday October 20 at 10.00pm.