ROMANIA
who are establishing sturgeon farms, while the other is trading in roe of pike, carp, and salmon. But it is the sturgeon farming that is Ms Maereanu’s passion. The commercial aspect of caviar and sturgeon meat production is just one facet of rearing sturgeons. She has 10 research projects studying how the fish will do in different types of growing systems and has published a number
of papers and three books. Sturgeon is a fascinating fish, but the long period before maturity makes it a difficult fish to make money from in the short term. The long production cycle make it necessary to have other sources of income that can be invested in the sturgeon rearing, which is where Ms Maereanu’s consulting activities come in very useful.
Danube Caviar Presei Street 6 Bucharest Romania Tel.: +40 722 204144 marilena.maereanu@gmail.com danubecaviar.com Owner: Marilena Maereanu
Activities: Sturgeon farming, consultancy services related to sturgeon production Products: Caviar, sturgeon meat, roe of pike, carp, salmon Volumes: 200-300 kg/year (caviar) Markets: USA, Germany, France (caviar), Romania (sturgeon meat)
The restaurant Victorita Pescarita features dishes based on time-tested recipes
Promoting the beneďŹ ts of ďŹ sh and seafood Marian Constantin Cuzdrioreanu is a larger than life (both ďŹ guratively and literally) ďŹ gure in the Romanian ďŹ sh processing sector. With interests in restaurants, ďŹ sh retail, trading, catering, and processing, Don Mariano, as he is known, is involved in virtually every aspect of the ďŹ sh business. He is also a keen promoter of ďŹ sh consumption which he does through his cooking show on television.
V
ictorita is a diminutive of Victoria, the name of Don Mariano’s mother after whom his seafood restaurant, Victorita Pescarita, in Bucharest is named. She is the first of the three generations of the family that are involved in the business. In addition to lending her name to the restaurant it is also her recipes, traditional favourites, that are prepared there and served to the guests. These dishes including salads made with the roe of carp or pikeperch, marinated fish from the Danube delta like Danube shad, small pelagic species from the Black Sea also marinated, smoked fish, vegetables cooked with the meat of common carp, and many more can be tasted at the restaurant, but are also prepared in the processing unit for sale in the fish shop or other retail outlets.
The use of conserving agents is proscribed For Mr Cuzdrioreanu, what is important is that the products are, as far as possible, natural, that is without the addition of artificial colours, flavours, or preservatives, as he thinks this is the way consumers’ interests are moving. The restaurant is a useful vehicle to try out these ideas and promote the concept of products without additives. Recently some of these products were promoted at the Green Week in Berlin an exhibition of food and agriculture products, and they will also be at Biofach in Nuremberg, the world’s leading exhibition of organic foodstuffs. The products are based primarily on wild fish, but fish farmed in Romania is also used for some items as
Mr Cuzdrioreanu considers it important also to promote the consumption of these products. We sell locally farmed sturgeon and carp to the Horeca sector, he says, and we would like to sell more but we do not produce enough. Only 20 of the supply in Romania is in fact Romanian fish. Consumers need to understand that cooking fish is not complicated, says Mr Cuzdrioreanu. On his cooking shows on television as he says, “I don’t cook for chefs, I cook for families,â€? the raw materials are simple, the ingredients are few, the cooking time is modest, and the results are outstanding. In keeping with the emphasis on health he eschews the use of large quantities of oil, and tends to grill, bake, or roast rather than fry. At the same time he talks about the raw
material providing information about nutritional content, cooking times, and alternative methods of preparing.
Understanding the customer is key to the business Both Mr Cuzdrioreanu’s children are involved in the business. Costin Cuzdrioreanu, his son runs the restaurant and is highly customer focused. Without understanding the customer we cannot make progress, he says, and the restaurant is where he can introduce products from different countries and gauge the reaction. Romanians have been travelling extensively and have discovered new species of fish and shellfish on their travels and would like to obtain them when they return home. Valuable knowledge
EUROFISH Magazine 2 / 2019
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