Anyone who has tasted Mt. Cook Alpine Salmon will understand why it's such a stand-out product, especially in the Singapore market, which is awash with salmon products loaded with additives, colourants and antibiotics, often from sources without any traceability.
As you might know, an important element of my ethos is to sell hormone- and antibiotic-free products from suppliers I have personally spent time with, visiting their farms and fisheries. This allows me to understand first hand how and by whom the products are raised, fed, cared for, shipped etc. It gives me insights and understanding beyond what I can ever know by simply sampling a product at the office or visiting a supplier's website.
This process was no different as I started out on my journey to source salmon when I set up the business. I flew to New Zealand, rightly deserving of its status as the best salmon producer in the world, and visited a number of fisheries. My experience at Mount Cook exceeded all my expectations; the team's passion and dedication to farming the salmon, protecting their sublime water source and environment, the focus on nutrition - every single touchpoint is a matter of world-class practice.
For anyone who needs proof of just how good this salmon is, Mount Cook Alpine Salmon has been recognised by the most exacting, demanding watchdog in the world - Seafood Watch, operated by the US-based Monterey Bay Aquarium (a not-for-profit organisation that assesses and ranks seafood sustainability and practices around the world). With an unprecedented score of 8.59 out of 10 for its ecological sustainability from Seafood Watch, Mt. Cook Alpine Salmon is the highest-scoring salmon farm in the Seafood Watch rating system. Its rating for both Freshwater and Marine Farms was that of Green or “BEST CHOICE”.
According to Lisa Tucker, Senior Acqaculture Scientist for Seafood Watch, the lack of chemical use was a major factor setting New Zealand king salmon apart from farmed salmon operations in other major producing regions. Unlike major production hubs such as Canada, Norway and Chile, the New Zealand salmon farming industry does not use parasiticides or antibiotics - this is one of the major reasons why I was so happy to secure this salmon, as additive-free fish is a really important aspect of what we sell at Sasha's Fine Foods.
Mount Cook Alpine Salmon has a history of firsts. It was the first Aquaculture facility in Australasia to achieve Best Aquaculture Practice certification from the Global Aquaculture Alliance in 2012, and first king (Chinook) salmon supplier to meet very specific sustainability requirements of the Whole Foods Market chain in the U.S. last year.
For those of you who may be interested in the area, Seafood Watch makes its science-based recommendations available to the public in the form of regional pocket guides and a downloadable app.
Mount Cook Alpine Salmon recently became the proud owners of their neighbours, Aoraki Smokehouse, which will allow the teams to integrate the cold and hot smoked salmon products more efficiently with less transport (better for the environment) and better scope for innovation.
I'm thrilled to be Singapore's exclusive retailer of this beautiful fish. Even those who usually don't like salmon have come to love Mount Cook (including my own kids!). The flavour is rich and mild, low in fat and needs nothing added in terms of cooking to make this a really special dish - a knob of butter and a squeeze of lemon is all it takes. Our full range of fresh, frozen and smoked salmon products can be found here.