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Serious Eats pointed us to a story (subscription required) in the latest issue of the New Yorker about what a difficult time Florida is having fighting off invasive species, specifically the Burmese python. As regular readers of this blog know, this happens to be one of our favorite topics, particularly the idea of eating them to extinction. The article is an excellent, if a bit depressing, read, explaining in great detail how impossibly difficult it is to control an invasive species.

The final section of the article focuses on a new up-and-coming (and terrifying, we might add) invasive: the Nile monitor lizard, which has taken over a section of Southwest Florida near Cape Coral. They can grow up to seven feet long, are incredibly aggressive, and according to one biologist, can "tear off your cat's head with one twist," yet for some inexplicable reason, they used to be popular as pets. Most people are just trying to avoid confrontations with the massive lizards, but some are going a few steps farther:

People are actually eatin' 'em over at Pine Island," [Robin] Snyder said. "A guy I went to school with said they're pretty good."

Photo: Jeppestown/flickr

Don't be surprised if grouper prices shoot up in the coming months. The fish may even disappear from restaurant menus. A recent rule is banishing long-line grouper fisherman — who catch 60 percent of the Gulf of Mexico's commercial grouper — from waters any shallower than 300 feet in order to help the threatened loggerhead turtles. It seems that lots of turtles are getting caught on the hooks laid on the ocean floor, so the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council voted to keep longliners out of the turtles' waters. The problem is that those are the same waters that red grouper like; you'd be hard pressed to find one in 300-foot-deep water.

And another measure limits longlining even further. Here's what the St. Pete Times had to say:

For part of the year, some longliners target "deep water" grouper like yellowedge, speckled hind, warsaw grouper and snowy grouper. Those species have a tight collective quota, which is typically filled about June or July.

After the "deep water" quota is met, longliners still could fish beyond 300 feet for gag grouper, because it lives all the way to shore and is considered a "shallow water" species. But the longliners would also kill a lot of deep water species in the process.

So the council decided to ban all longline fishing in the eastern gulf once the deep water quota is met.

On the upside, turtles will be safer, and now might be a good time to do a little recreational fishing on the Gulf coast. You'll have a lot less competition from commercial boats.

Loggerhead turtle rule will hurt gulf's grouper industry [St. Petersburg Times]

Photo, of a grouper sandwich at Sharkey's in St. Augustine: WordRidden/flickr

Had to happen in Florida. A pizzeria owner in Palm Coast (about halfway between Daytona and St. Augustine) pistol whipped a customer who had the nerve to complain about his calzone:

Joseph Milano, the owner of Goomba's Pizzeria, has been charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and released on bail.

According to a police report, security footage from the pizzeria shows that Milano struck Richard Phinney with a gun. He then jumped over a counter and started to assault Phinney and his roommate.

Phinney was at the pizzeria to collect a refund for a calzone, which he said was prepared incorrectly. He was taken to a hospital after the incident with a bloodied head.

It's the same old battle: conservationists vs. fishermen. This time, the controversy surrounds the soft-shell turtle. Conservationists and Gov. Charlie Crist want to stop the harvesting of wild turtles, while people who do exactly that for a living are, naturally, a little upset. The former group is issuing alarmist warnings about possible population decline, while the latter group points out that there are turtles aplenty:

In a recent letter, Crist urged the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to make it illegal to take any freshwater turtles from the wild.

"With the world market demand for freshwater turtles, it is clear that the commercial harvest of our wild populations of turtles could result in long-term impacts very quickly," he wrote in a letter to commission chairman Rodney Barreto. "According to many turtle biologists, if the (commission) is not vigilant and does not act swiftly we could be in grave danger of irreparable damage to our turtle population."

Those who have fished for turtles in and around Lake Okeechobee for decades have a visceral, if simple, reaction to Crist's call for conservation: Hogwash.

"He's ignorant. No offense to the governor, but there's no other word for it: ignorant," said William Shockley, who grew up in Okeechobee as the son and grandson of commercial fishermen.

An electrical contractor by trade, Shockley still fishes for turtles to help his 16-year-old son make spending money by selling the critters that fetch between $1.25 and $1.50 a pound.

"I can take you to places near 20-mile bend where there's more turtles than there are people in Palm Beach County," he said.

Conservationists call for ban on freshwater turtle catches [Palm Beach Post]
China Turns to Florida After Eating Turtles to Near-Extinction [MP: South Florida]

We humans are pretty good at eating fish until near-extinction; these days, we're constantly inundated with information about collapsing populations and warnings about what we shouldn't eat. Well here is one fish you absolutely should eat: lionfish. In fact, the goal is to eat it to extinction, at least in the Atlantic, where it is invasive and currently devouring reef fish populations.

The simple solution, of course, would be to get humans to develop a taste for the fish, which is exactly what the Key Largo-based Reef Environmental Education Foundation (REEF) is trying to do. In the Bahamas, where the waters are inundated with lionfish, several chefs have gotten creative, frying it, baking it and slicing it into ceviche.

"We don't have them in the Keys yet, but as soon as the current brings them around the Gulf, we'll get them. They're already along the whole east coast, Deerfield and north," said REEF's executive director Lisa Mitchell.

The problem may be working around federal regulations. Chefs in the Bahamas are currently supplied with lionfish by divers who spear the fish, according to Mitchell. It's easier to get restrictions loosened to allow for spearfishing of lionfish when dealing with a small island government; the US government promises many more layers of bureaucracy, which is one reason why it may take a while longer before we see the fish on restaurant menus in Florida. They won't respond to a hook and line; the fish need to be speared or trapped.

Lionfish are popular in aquariums because of their distinctive beautiful spines. But, like in the case of most exotic pets (see also: pythons, iguanas), they grow too big and often end up dumped into the ocean by exasperated owners.

In the water, the fish delivers a sting with some venom, but according to Mitchell, the flesh is completely safe to eat. "There's a sac of poison on either side of the dorsal spine," Mitchell said. "All you have to do is fillet it and make sure you don't spear yourself."

This has got all of the current "in" buzzwords covered: you could eat fish (healthy!) caught in nearby waters (local!) while helping to save the reefs (green!). So here's hoping the group can get some local chefs to step up to the plate.

REEF: Lionfish Research Program [Official Site]
Lionfish devastate Florida's native shoals [The Times]

Photo: jrotunda85/flickr

It seems there was no fanfare, press releases or anything. Disney World just removed any foie gras from the menus at the four restaurants in the theme park that offer it, according to the Orlando Sentinel:

On Oct. 1, Disney dumped the traditional French appetizer, made of fattened duck or goose liver, at the last four Disney World restaurants to offer it -- Victoria & Albert's, California Grill, Citricos and Les Chefs de France.

Disney insisted Friday that this was no political statement. Officials wouldn't even comment on the international animal-rights campaign that calls foie gras production cruel and inhumane and seeks to persuade restaurants to drop the dish.

"It's really just about making adjustments to the menu," Disney World spokeswoman Andrea Finger said.

That said, let's just hope neighboring Florida municipalities don't follow suit.

Disney's menu change is good for the goose, not the gourmet [Orlando Sentinel]

Photo, of foie gras at Victoria & Albert's: ninjapoodles/flickr

Exporters are shipping up to 3,000 pounds of softshell turtles a week out of Tampa International Airport, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. A Fort Lauderdale seafood company is buying about 5,000 pounds of softshell turtles a week. They're worth about $2 a pound to the harvesters.

"Asian countries are causing the extinction, the near extinction or the endangerment of every species of turtle they have over there, so now they're turning to the United States to supply their insatiable demand for turtle," said Matt Aresco, a turtle biologist from the Panhandle.

The trend — which biologists worry threatens species survival — has surfaced at places like Newnan's Lake near Gainesville. Last summer, as Gary Simpson jotted down the license plate number of a suspicious-looking pickup, he wondered about the bulging sacks in the truck bed. Simpson, who manages a tackle shop, worried poachers had filled the sacks with fish.

After he used his pocket knife to slash open a sack, "Turtles started piling out," he said. There were at least a dozen in each of the 20 sacks, he said. "It was pretty obscene, it really was."

By the time the truck's owners had returned to the dock, he said, "those turtles were crawling all over the parking lot." Wildlife officers summoned by Simpson were waiting — but they had to let the turtle-catchers go because they had broken no law.

Other states — Alabama and Texas, among others — have recently restricted or banned the harvest of turtles. As those states have cut off access, the harvesters have focused more and more on Florida's turtles, Aresco said.

The harvesters target the larger turtles, the ones old enough to reproduce, Aresco said. Wipe out those and soon all the turtles will be gone.

China gobbling up Florida turtles [St. Petersburg Times]

Photo: Town Homes of Marlwood

After a three-year battle, the legal issues between the New York City Police Department and the Florida-based NYPD Pizzeria chain are over. The restaurant can keep the name, but the logo has to be redesigned so that it doesn't resemble a police uniform's patch, and the company cannot open any restaurants in the New York tristate area.

The three NYPD restaurants in South Florida (Boynton Beach, Palm Beach Gardens, and Royal Palm Beach) don't appear to be affiliated with the restaurant chain, despite the shared name. Perhaps they're too small to register on the NYPD's radar. Or maybe they're up next. Might want to purge any police-related decor stat.

Florida-based NYPD pizza chain can keep its name [The Guardian]
NYPD Pizzeria [Official Site]
NYPD (Boynton Beach) [MenuPages]
NYPD (Palm Beach Gardens) [MenuPages]
NYPD Pizza III (Royal Palm Beach) [MenuPages]

Has anyone seen the latest issue of Florida Monthly magazine? The "Best of Florida" list for 2008 is out, and it's a looooong one. There are some puzzling categories (the Castillo de San Marcos in St Augustine won "best historical landmark" for the eighth year in a row, because really, how often do new historical landmarks pop up to challenge the leaders?) as well as some puzzling results (Pleasure Island wins "best nightspot" over South Beach? Seriously?). It should be noted that the winners are voted on by the magazine's readers, so the editorial staff cannot be blamed for that nightlife gaffe. The entire list is here, but if you're only interested in the food-focused ones, they're after the jump.

Continue reading "Florida Monthly Releases Best Of Florida 2008" »

At least 10 people in Palm Beach have contracted ciguatera from grouper, and from the details given in this Palm Beach Post article, it sounds like hell:

With blurred vision, aching joints and burning skin, the men struggled to hold down food. At night, they itched so badly that they scratched parts of their skin off and couldn't sleep.

The culprit: a dinner of yellowfin grouper that left the fishermen feeling as though they might die.

"It was the worst I've ever felt," said Tim Sperling, 52, of Jupiter, who along with John Ely, 50, of North Palm Beach, contracted ciguatera during a sport-fishing trip in the Bahamas in mid-June. "I didn't eat anything solid for eight days. I lost 14 pounds."

Aside from this fishing trip to the Bahamas that went very wrong, authorities have tied a few ciguatera cases to fish sold at a Whole Foods. Federal officials are trying to pinpoint the area where these toxic fish are hiding, so as to prohibit fishing there, but, well, given the government's recent inability to pinpoint the cause of the salmonella outbreak (and tomatoes don't move around!), we're not holding our breath. And we might stay away from the grouper for a while.

On the other hand, 14 pounds in eight days? Sounds like the next miracle diet ready to hit South Beach.

Men recount agony at sea after eating tainted grouper [Palm Beach Post]
Ciguatera [Wikipedia]

Photo, of a yellowfin grouper, so you know what you're up against: Scubaben/flickr

It seems that restaurant grease, which used to be thought of mostly as trash, is now a hot commodity because of rising gas prices, according to the St Pete Times. Griffin Industries, a Kentucky-based company that collects restaurant grease in 21 different states, has complained that the drums of grease are gone by the time its workers come by to collect them.

The competition for Florida grease has become so heated that several grease collection companies are suing each other, claiming everything from theft to unfair competition. One company official from Boca Raton said he has bought $50,000 in surveillance equipment, including night-vision goggles, to try to stop all the stealing.

"I tell people every day, I'm in a war," said Pat Cassese, operations manager of Universal Grease.

How did grease get so hot? Blame it on the increase in gasoline prices.

Restaurant grease can be turned into biodiesel fuel, which produces far less air pollution than regular diesel. It has slowly gained in popularity as an alternative fuel for powering trucks, farm equipment, boats, anything with a diesel engine. Pinellas County's dump trucks burn biodiesel, as do fire trucks on Sanibel Island and military vehicles at Eglin Air Force Base in the Panhandle.

Griffin Industries has been handling restaurant grease for decades, filtering it to make "yellow grease," the basic ingredient for biodiesel.

In the past year, the price of yellow grease has climbed from just over $2 a gallon to nearly $3.50 a gallon in the Southeast, according to the Jacobsen, a Chicago agency that tracks renewable fuels. That's still below the cost of a gallon of gas.

Restaurants used to pay Griffin to pick up the grease. Now Griffin often pays them.

"Grease is no different from diamonds," Chris Griffin said. "They both have value, they're both a commodity. Right now it's the highest market I've ever seen."

Slick Florida thieves haul off grease [St Petersburg Times]

Photo: mikeysklar/flickr

The state is expected to face a $3.5 billion budget shortfall, so Stuart Blumberg, president and CEO of the Greater Miami & The Beaches Hotel Association, suggested that restaurants pick up the slack with a two percent tax on all food and beverage sales.

It also resolves an inequity between hotels and restaurants, he says. "By agreeing to a bed tax, the hotels have been carrying the burden for 30-plus years. Our partners in the restaurant industry haven't contributed anything except sales tax."

Not so fast, argues Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association President and CEO Carol Dover. In 2007, restaurants paid $3.9 billion in taxes. Furthermore, bed tax revenue must be used for tourism-related activities, such as ad campaigns and convention center expansions, not budget shortfalls, Dover says.

And unlike hotels, where the customer base is mostly from out of state, it's locals who fuel the restaurant industry. "Stu's contention that this will only affect tourists is just wrong," says Dover.

And in other news, remember that toilet paper bill the Florida legislature was considering? The state House of Representatives decided to drop the bill, since state regulators already include bathrooms in restaurant inspections.

Hotel lobbyist proposes 2% restaurant tax [Orlando Business Journal]
House discards toilet-paper bill aimed at restaurants [Orlando Sentinel]
Fla Legislators Wasting Time On Toilet Paper [MP: South Florida]