Robert Wholey & Co. prides itself on supplying whiting fillets that are ''fresh from the ocean''.
They achieve this high quality standard by sealing in the flavour the minute the fish is caught in the pristine pacific waters off the coast of British Columbia, Canada and having it frozen and ready for the customer within hours after it is pulled from the water, the whole time preserving its freshness.
In Spring of 2003, Wholey acquired a Deepchill Variable-State Ice System from Sunwell Technologies Inc. of Canada. The deepchill slurry ice is now an integral part of Wholey's recipe for freshness.
Every day, Wholey's boats leave the Ucluelet Harbour, looking for a fresh catch. The fish is pulled from the icy waters and unloaded at the dock within 8 hours. The unloaded whiting is placed into totes filled with deepchill ice. The entire catch will be processed within the next 22 hours. The temperature is constantly checked to make sure the fish is kept cold and fresh.
Julie Edwards, General Manager of Robert Wholey & Co. Canada Ltd. stated, "I think that this ice is a solution in itself for the product.
The uniqueness of the fact that every bit of the fish is covered with the ice -- it goes right into the gill cavity, it goes all around the head and all through the body and I think that's very different than other ice systems.
It's not like a flake ice that has to melt down in order to join up with water or a system where you're mixing the two (water and flake ice), this ice, actually like little tiny ball bearings goes all around the fish. I think that this is really the best kind of ice for this product -- when I'm processing fish I want it to be very cold so the customer, when they get the fish at home, has the very best dinner." The fish is protected and maintained in these deepchill filled totes on the short trip to the Wholey processing plant.
At their nearby HACCP certified plant, the fish is cleaned and filleted to achieve the best yield. According to Edwards, "Since we've installed the deepchill system, we have found that it's fantastic for the product.
"We are getting the fillets cleaner, fresher and faster off the knife because the fish are colder and we're able to supply a much better quality product to our customers. Our yields have gone up 1.5%. Because the yields are higher and the fish are colder, we are putting through more product, so we actually went up 4% on our production amounts."
The fillets are then quickly frozen in a state-of-the-art tunnel freezer and then sprayed with fresh water to prevent dehydration, resulting in moister, tastier fish. The final step is the packaging of the whiting, which is done less than thirty hours after swimming in the ocean. The fish is then transported in refrigerated trucks to stores across the United States or sold in bulk by container shipments around the world.
Since Wholey whiting is kept cool from the minute it is pulled from the water until the customer takes it from the freezer to cook, it always tastes "fresh from the ocean".
