Florida Keys seafood safe to eat after gulf oil spill?

[fuzzybabybunny]

My parents and I will be there in a couple weeks. Last time we were there we really enjoyed the Key West Shrimp - buying it fresh at the markets and cooking them in the hotel room. But now we're wondering... Is the shrimp and seafood in general safe to eat after the oil spill, and any good cheap fish markets you can recommend?

 

[Wookie]

The Keys were not affected by the oil spill, except by the press telling everyone how we were about to be inundated by oil. The places where Key West Pink shrimp come from were not effected by oil. There was and is no oil on the southwestern shelf of Florida.

As far as seafood goes, you can have it good or you can have it cheap. Pick either. The place you're looking for to buy shrimp is Fishbusters on Stock Island, mile marker 5. That's where shrimp boats unload in Key West. Anyone else is trucking it in.

 

[Glock Diver]

Yes, the seafood in the Keys is safe.

Actually, all commercially available gulf coast seafood is safe too, all the way up the Florida panhandle. Has been safe for months.

 

[FL-Jack]

The seafood in The Keys was never affected by the oil spill in the first place! I have been eating it the entire time as I always have.

Please keep in mind that the reason they knew there was oil there in the first place is because it actually seeps from the bottom in the Gulf region and actually is a carbon source for organisms in the area anyway. It has always been a part of the ecosystem.

The only true 'disaster' was the knee jerk media reaction who could careless about the science or the people they hurt with their bias opinions and coverage.

 

[100days-a-year]

Now....the e-coli might be a problem but not the oil

 

[CaptEsteban]

Never was a problem in the Keys.

 

[djtimmy77]

How much of the seafood on the menu at the restaurants in the Keys is actually from the keys? I know a little further up the coast here most of the fish you order at restaurants or buy in the fish markets is imported from other countries, and hence I won't order seafood at local restaurants very often.

 

[100days-a-year]

Ask if the seafood is local and learn to tell the difference,most seafood is mismarked or misrepresented.Basa and catfish is routinely sold as grouper or snapper and farm raised shrimp(in conditions too disgusting to describe) as local.

 

[Wookie]

Knowing seasons and local fish helps. If the restaurant is peddling local red snapper, it may not be either one. Grouper has a very limited season in the keys. If they are cooking yellowtail, you can probably be safe it is. Mahi mahi is likely off the truck, as are oysters, tilefish, and probably shrimp. (It's way cheaper to buy it from a place like Ft. Myers where 50 shrimp boats dock than it is in Key West, where 4 shrimp boats dock. There are other problems with local Key West shrimp markets, but that's for another time and place.) If the finer restaurants (915 Duval, Kelly's, Square Grouper, A&B Lobster House, etc.) say it's local, it probably is. If the restaurant has a fish dock behind it, they are likely getting first choice. If you think you're getting local fish at Turtle Krawls or Conch Republic Seafood, well, you're the tourist they are looking for.

 

[djtimmy77]

Up here in Palm Beach County, Mahi Mahi is usually from Costa Rica or Panama....even at the fish market. If it is likely "off the truck" it is likely from the same place.