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November 17, 2011

Thanksgiving is a week away from today and while everybody’s mind is on the great feast ,and any turkey still walking on the earth is very nervous, we have a couple of great features for the weekend that revolve around seafood.

First and foremost we have a good buy on Tuna this weekend. We are featuring number 2 bread-loaf loins from Louisiana and Central America @ Skin/on Tuna Loins for 7.39 lb.; Tuna Breadloaf Loins for $9.39/lb.; and Steaks for $10.99/lb.


We also received some of the last of the season Alaskan King Crab Clusters that weigh almost 2 pounds each for $21.95 per pound. This is about the same price as big frozen legs but they are fresh!

By the way we would like to mention, for those of you who are not aware, nobody does portioning better that Inland Seafood. We may charge a little bit more but we give you a usable, beautiful portioned fish that is what you would want for a plate presentation if you cut it yourself. We probably cut more off than anybody else in the industry to give you a good plate presentation and that’s why we charge a little bit more for the product than our competitors, but the workmanship and the quality will be so much better and this we guarantee or your money back.

The other feature that we have for this weekend is 3-4 oz. Mahi Mahi value portions at $3.99/lb. This is a by-product of our portioning program and this just goes to show you that we cut a lot off of the fish when we portion your product. It is sort of like buying a center cut strip steak versus a vein-in strip steak. You always get what you pay for; especially with fresh portioned seafood.

We just received a shipment of Eden Farms Spiral-Sliced Berkshire Pork Smoked Hams today right out of the Eden Farms smoker. Normally we do a pre-sale on these but we did not do that this year. They have become so popular we brought in a lot of hams for Thanksgiving and it is first come, first serve.

But if you did not pre-order your Turkeys from Bell & Evans, all we really have left are larger Turkeys, 16 lbs and up at this point. Please tell your sales rep what you would need of these as we have very few available. We are talking to Bell and Evans, as well as Koch All-Natural, about additional birds so if you did not pre-order and want the very best give us your wish list. We will see what we can find.

Another piece of great news we want to share with you is that after a remodeling of the smoker, Woodsmoke Provisions is back in business with their wonderful Smoked Salmon. We now have a great inventory of their Pre-Sliced Blue Label Salmon sides, flavored smoked sides as well as their world famous, at least Southern famous, Pecan-Smoked North Carolina Trout. Call and stock up for the holidays. We know it is fresh as it actually came out of the smoker yesterday. It couldn’t be any better for the holidays .We carry other labels and brands but the outcry from customers made us realize how special this Handcrafted product truly is in this industrial world.

We are also running specials on various Appetizers which would be good for any buffet or banquet that you are going to hold for the holidays. In addition we will be running some close outs on some items that may be good for your buffet. Check with your Inland sales rep and see what we are offering because we have limited quantities for the couple of items that would be great on a holiday buffet if you feed a lot of people.

Again we ask you to let us know about Shucked Oysters, Clams, Fresh and Pasteurized Crabmeat and Oysters on the Half-Shell for the holiday because they are sure to go very, very quickly and we want to make sure that you are covered.

On the Fresh Fish front we have never seen prices this high going into to week of Thanksgiving. Normally we see prices really come way down before Thanksgiving but this year it doesn’t appear that is going to happen.

Grouper is still astronomical. Grouper and Snapper are very high due to poor weather in the fishing areas in the United States and in Central America but we did get some Caribbean Red Snapper and Mexican Grouper this morning.

We are expecting a boatload of Domestic Red Grouper this evening as well.

Swordfish is very high because the catch is over in New England.

Even Mahi Mahi, which should be very plentiful right now, is up in price because of poor weather and what appears to be the beginning of another La Nina in Central America. We are sending a member of our staff into the field in Guatemala and Honduras, where the Mahi shows up first in the season, over the weekend to get measurements of the water temperature and see what the boats are saying directly. We hope to have this report by Monday or Tuesday to let you know if it is indeed another La Nina in the making. It would be very unusual if this happens but it is not unheard of.

Scallops are expensive but we did get some Nantucket Bays. We hope to have some more for the weekend but we are not positive. We will get a little for the beginning of the week but traditionally luxury seafood is on the back burner as the turkey is in the oven.

Flounder and Striped Bass from Virginia, which is normally very plentiful at this time, have really not begun, largely due to weather and rough seas. We’re just not sure why there is not more product in the marketplace at this point but there definitely is not enough to moderate prices. Everything seems to be very tight in seafood, we hope the situation gets better over the next couple of days.

On Farm-Raised Salmon, we will have a good supply of whole, gorgeous Scottish Salmon, as well as Scottish and Norwegian Filets and regular Atlantic Filets. We are bringing in a big shipment this weekend, due to special orders, of Norwegian Salmon Trout/Steelhead. To compare this Norwegian Salmon Trout/Steelhead to the Salmon Trout/Steelhead that comes out of Chili or Canada is like comparing dry aged prime beef with select no-grade beef although they are the same genetic species. The difference is night and day and your customer will appreciate the difference. The marbling is unbelievable; this is a beautiful fish for you to consider using.

Please give us all of your pre-orders for Wild Mushrooms, especially Chanterelles, because there is a high demand for Mushrooms during the holiday next week.