Alex Villani of Blue Moon Fish, working the waters of Long Island Sound. Alex has been selling his catch directly to New Yorkers at the city's Greenmarkets for over twenty years. The Greenmarkets offer one of the bafflingly few opportunities in NYC, and the nation, to buy fish directly from the people who catch it.
It’s not easy finding fresh fish in New York. Or anywhere in the United States for that matter. Just about all fish is marketed as ‘fresh,’ but in reality, the vast majority of seafood consumed here winds its way through the labrynthine maze of the commodity markets – from sea to net to a boat’s frozen hold, and back to dock where it’s sold, first to a wholesaler who brings it hundreds of miles to the Fulton Fish Market, where it’s sold again to distributors who truck it back to their local markets to in turn sell it, once again, to retailers or chefs…all before the fillet finds its way to your plate.
But as evidenced by the long lines at the Blue Moon Fish stand at the Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket every weekend, the people want fresh fish. The city’s Greenmarkets offer one of the city’s maddeningly few opportunities to buy fish directly from the people who actually catch it.
Alex Villani of Blue Moon Fish has been fishing the inshore and offshore waters around Long Island for over forty years, and selling his catch directly to urban pescaphiles for two decades at several city Greenmarkets. We sat down with Alex at Grand Army Plaza to learn more about life on the open seas.
So Alex, how did you end up as a commercial fisherman?
I grew up in Chelsea, on the west side of Manhattan, which is kind of weird. I’m probably the only commercial fisherman from Chelsea. When I was eighteen, in 1970, my parents moved out on me. They moved to Long Island and I stayed behind in the apartment in the city. I had a pretty good time. It was 1970 and I was eighteen years old, living alone in the city.
But then my mom passed away and my dad was having a hard time, so I moved out to the island. I kept the apartment in the city for a while, but I wasn’t doing anything there other than screwing up and having fun. So out on Long Island, I started clamming.
When I was about twelve or thirteen, I had a friend who had a clam boat on Great South Bay, the bay between Fire Island and the main part of Long Island. I worked on the boat with him for a few weeks and I always remembered it being a pretty nice job. I liked being outside. So when I moved out to Long Island to be with my father I bought a three hundred dollar boat and a four hundred dollar engine and started clamming. I didn’t really know what I was doing. I just went out by myself and said, “This is pretty cool.” I just went out and did it. And it was fine. Continue reading
