description

Striped like its jungle namesake, the black tiger shrimp is available year-round and is one of Asia’s major aquaculture products. Most tiger shrimp is farmed, though a significant amount is harvested from the wild by trawlers working mud bottoms from very shallow water to depths beyond 300 feet. The largest of 300 commercially available shrimp species worldwide, tigers can grow to 13 inches, but harvest size averages 9 to 11 inches. Many countries supply black tigers from both farmed and wild sources. The species is distributed over a huge range, from east and southeast Africa through the Red Sea and Arabian Gulf, around the Indian subcontinent and through the Malay Archipelago to northern Australia and the Philippines. Important suppliers include Thailand, Bangladesh, India, Indonesia and Malaysia. Asian suppli­ers generally offer state-of-the-art packing and processing; many follow HACCP guidelines developed for U.S. operations. Farmed black tiger shrimp have a mild, almost bland flavor compared to the pronounced taste of ocean-harvested Gulf shrimp. Cooked tiger’s meat is also softer than that of other shrimp species. Tigers have gray to black stripes on gray or bluish shells and associated stripes on the peeled meat. The cooked shell turns bright red. The white flesh is tinged with orange if cooked peeled and red if cooked in the shell. Meat should be slightly resilient and moist. Black Tiger Shrimp have a firm texture and a clean - somewhat sweet flavor. Those raised in farms - with lower salinity in the water - tend to be a bit milder than ocean-caught Shrimp. When cooked, meat turns white and their black stripes turn bright red. Improper storage tempera­tures, refreezing or extended frozen storage can turn shrimp tough, dry and fibrous. A black spot on the shell indicates melanosis.

The following tips and tricks will help you find the answer. Let’s get started. Things to watch out for when purchasing shrimp.

Almost all shrimp available at stores are frozen. When purchasing shrimp (fresh, frozen, or defrosted), watch out for the following things.

Smell: The shrimp should smell like seawater, or like fresh fish. If iodine or ammonia smell is there, don’t purchase.

Color: Avoid those shrimp which have pinkish coloration to the meat. Similarly, black or brown spots or lines on the skin indicate that the shrimp has been around too long. Shrimp are highly resilient to overfishing because they have a short lifespan, are fast growers and produce many young. Farmed Black Tiger Shrimp have been ranked on the “avoid” list by environmental organizations. This ranking is due to pollution including - nutrient effluent discharge, use of banned antibiotics and habitat degradation. In addition - depending on the country - management practices are sometimes non-existent or poorly enforced.