Hello reader, it's a fine sunny Saturday morning so hopefully all the black ice which caught me unawares this earlier has melted in the winter's sun. This blog post is a continuation of the series of articles featuring the Dorset Farmers Markets monthly visits to Blandford Forum.
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| Dorset Shellfish 07881 632311 Dorset Shellfish is a small business based in Weymouth, run by a couple - Graham & Caroline - the first thing to come across about them both, is their total enthusiasm for their livelihood. |
Above - It's Grahams turn to take the Dorset Shellfish farmers market stall to Blandford
Now it's Carolines turn to staff their market stall at the The Blandford Yuletide Festival !
Graham and Caroline have been running Dorset Shellfish for a few years now, so they are really quite established in their field of business. Caroline says her boyfriend Graham, sets off to sea in their small fishing boat at 5.30 in the morning and ventures 8 miles south east of Portland Bill and he usually makes it back to shore again round about 4 o clock in the afternoon, so all in all this is half an hour shy of a twelve hour working day and even after that there's obviously more work to be done - gosh I had no idea that Fishermen / women / folk (political correctness) spent so long a shift on the seas catching fish for the rest of us to eat and nor did I realise that they went so far out.
Crabs and lobsters are among some of the local sea food produce that Graham & Caroline sell at Farmers Markets in Blandford Forum and around Dorset
The seafood that Dorset Shellfish catches and dresses up - boils in salted water or makes pates from etc are sustainable, not being too sure exactly what sustainable meant in relation to fishing produce, I asked Caroline to explain and she informed me that any catch of wet fish (cod etc) or shell fish (lobster etc) has to be a certain size and if any catch falls below the minimum it has to be put back in to the sea alive, following on from this I asked Caroline if she felt that the law under the European Union had negatively affected Dorset Shellfish and Caroline answered to the positive by stating as far as she's concerned that EU statute guidelines on the sustainability of fish in the sea was a good thing and was helpful to Dorset Shellfish - so there I've been told !
More of Grahams & Carolines shell fish produce
which as you can see in this photo include scallops, whelks and crab meat
Graham & Caroline are always keen and eager to offer their Dorset Farmers Market customers friendly advice such as how to cook the shell fish and what the nutritional value is of each particular shell fish and also their pates etc, so why not pop along and buy yourself some bargain healthy local fresh shell fish from this couple team, at the next farmers market in Blandford, one or the other of them is sure to be there !
The next Dorset Farmers Market is a Christmas special tomorrow - Sun 18th Dec in
Shaftesbury 9.00hrs - 13.00hrs
Disclaimer: The Blandford Buzz hasn't received any payment to feature The Dorset Farmers Market or Boasty's on this blog post.