Anna Maria Fish Company wins award for Cortez bottarga

The Anna Maria Fish Company was recently award a prestigious 2017 Good Food Award in the preserved fish category for its Cortez bottarga, the sun-cured roe of grey striped mullet.

Owned by Seth Cripe and Ed Chiles, the Anna Maria Fish Company, was the first in the United States to produce bottarga.

The Good Food Awards are granted to outstanding American food producers and the farmers who provide their ingredients. This is the first year the Good Food Awards have featured a preserved fish category.

“It has been a great privilege to join Seth in this important endeavor,” said Chiles in a press release. “His passion and vision for artisanally producing a value-added product from our community’s No. 1 heritage seafood resource is something that can be a game changer for our local fishing community, while branding our area and providing a model for how other communities can look at their local resources for value added opportunities as well. This is about heritage, history and economic development that is done in a sustainable way."

Anna Maria Fish Company produces more than 1,500 pounds of bottarga annually and is served locally at Chiles’ Sandbar, Beach House and Mar Vista Dockside restaurants, according to the release.

This story was originally published February 21, 2017 at 1:17 PM with the headline "Anna Maria Fish Company wins award for Cortez bottarga."