It’s been almost 1 month since Alaska’s 2011 long­line fish­ery opened. Maybe you’ve seen ban­ners around your grocery’s seafood counter, pro­mot­ing the sud­den mar­ket avail­abil­i­ty.  “Fresh Alas­ka hal­ibut is here!”

Less­er known among Amer­i­cans is black cod (aka sable­fish) which is also being fished right now. Japan­ese and Euro­pean mar­kets have been clam­or­ing for black cod for decades, and domes­tic inter­est is increas­ing. These tor­pe­do-shaped beau­ties saunter through the dark­est depths of our Gulf waters, requir­ing gear set in up to 400 fath­oms. Some per­spec­tive: walk­ing that length from ocean sur­face to sea floor would be the equiv­a­lent of climb­ing three-quar­ters of the way up Mt. Edge­cumbe, a stren­u­ous day’s hike. Fish­ing in such depth places tremen­dous ten­sion on the line, mak­ing this a high­er-stress, high­er-risk fish­ery than some others.

(Ten years lat­er, I still remem­ber the T‑shirt a local fish­er­woman was wear­ing in the P Bar – that’s Sitka’s Pio­neer Bar, for those who haven’t been. Hand­made, white let­ters blaz­ing from a black back­ground, it boast­ed, “Long­lin­ers do it deeper.”)

Snap­ping on bait­ed “tube gear” on the main­line that’s fly­ing by. Very tense line, very tense crew.

Like hal­ibut, black cod is man­aged by an Indi­vid­ual Fish­ing Quo­ta (IFQ) sys­tem. Alaska’s long­line fish­eries are heav­i­ly-reg­u­lat­ed and metic­u­lous­ly mon­i­tored, earn­ing both of these species a “Best Choice” sus­tain­abil­i­ty rat­ing from SeaWatch’s Marine Stew­ard­ship Coun­cil.  The Nation­al Marine Fish­eries Sys­tem has an excel­lent sum­ma­ry of the black cod’s life his­to­ry, habi­tat, man­age­ment and sustainability.

Black cod might as well be black gold. A lim­it­ed num­ber of boats can par­tic­i­pate in this fish­ery, and with deliv­er­ies earn­ing close to $7 per pound, the com­pe­ti­tion for deck­hand posi­tions is Decem­ber-gale fierce. Though I grew up in the fleet, I didn’t man­age to land a spot on a long­lin­er until I was in my late 20’s. I’d been squeez­ing salt water from my socks for over 2 decades before the first vel­vety bit of black cod melt­ed on my tongue.

That first bite was instant love, but as with many things, love wasn’t enough. My freez­er rarely con­tained this rich white meat. A deck­hand doesn’t walk away with much take-home fish – par­tic­u­lar­ly not at these prices. My world shift­ed when a friend intro­duced me to black cod tips.

Black cod are sold head­ed & gut­ted. The heads are chopped off by the pro­cess­ing plant, slat­ed for dis­pos­al. Tips are a deli­cious nugget of meat nes­tled between the jaw and col­lar.  Too small and time-con­sum­ing to be lucra­tive for a busi­ness, they’re per­fect for the local sal­vager who’s will­ing to dump­ster dive for fish.

If you’re lucky enough to have a fish­er­friend you can beg some black cod tips from, the sun is indeed shin­ing on you, my friend.  Oth­er­wise, check in with your local seafood store and con­sid­er splurg­ing on a fil­let.  It’s not cheap, but it’s a rich fla­vor where a small piece will pro­vide mon­u­men­tal taste (along with high omega‑3’s and oth­er heart-relat­ed good-for-you’s.)

Please check back in for more of this series: in Part 2 I’ll share a mari­nade recipe that’s a Sit­ka clas­sic, and we’ll share a trib­ute to our friends in Japan in Part 3, with a black cod miso soup recipe.  Mean­while, best wish­es to the men and women longlin­ing out of Sit­ka, fac­ing 13′ seas right now — stay safe, sweeties.