A NorCal chef opted for a Pescatarian Menu instead of supporting local regenerative meat

Instead of supporting the numerous regenerative livestock farmers in her region, a Bay Area chef has opted to provide a pescatarian menu.

Three-star Michelin chef Dominique Crenn recently announced that her Northern California restaurant will no longer serve meat in an effort to demonstrate to the general public that plant-based eating is possible.

One of her restaurants, Petit Crenn, has been pescatarian since 2015 while her other restaurant, Atelier, has been meat-free for two years. Her new project, Boutique Crenn, opening in Salesforce Tower in San Francisco next year will be vegetarian also.

"Meat is complicated," she told CNN Travel in an interview about her meat-free decision. "We have to be thoughtful about the ecosystem that we're living in and not to destroy it because of the instant gratification and the demand of others."

Located in the Bay Area surrounded by countless grass-fed and regenerative-focused livestock operations, Crenn’s choice to eschew meat in favor of a pescatarian menu is a sadly missed opportunity to demonstrate that better meat is possible. 

One of the biggest challenges facing the scaling of regenerative meat is creating a supply chain that supports meat producers and provides a fair price for the extra labor, attention, and planning that goes into holistic livestock management and well-managed grazing. This is not to say that conventional beef producers deserve lower prices for their beef, but that the conventional beef market does not distinguish between a steer produced regeneratively and a steer produced in a continuous grazing system. This makes it difficult for ranchers to receive part of the premium that retailers eventually attach to meat produced using regenerative practices. 

Building a consistent supply chain for regeneratively raised meat will help more ranchers adopt better grazing management practices, leading to ecosystem improvement, improved animal welfare, and more carbon sequestration. Restaurants can play a key role not only in helping to establish a wholesale market for better meat but in bringing awareness to the consumers who dine at their restaurants.

Fortunately, some chefs see the major opportunity they have to help take regenerative meat mainstream. In London, co-founders Gary and Catherine Solomon recently launched a regenerative-focused restaurant concept called 28 Well Hung. The Solomons launched the restaurant as a response to climate change with the intent of sourcing organic, grass-fed beef as locally as possible as part of a global effort to regenerate 1 billion hectares of grassland by 2025. The duo works in partnership with farmers who use well-managed grazing and responsible soil stewardship to produce meat. 

Crenn also recently spoke on a panel at Salesforce’s Dreamforce conference where none of the meals included beef, according to the SF Chronicle. Salesforce stated that the decision was driven by a desire to be more sustainable and to conserve as much as 9 million gallons of water.

As we’ve discussed previously on Sacred Cow, statistics regarding the amount of water required to produce beef are grossly misrepresented. Most of the water associated with beef production, including both grass-finished and grain-finished, comes from green water, which is naturally occurring rainfall that falls on pastures and grasslands regardless of whether cattle are there.

Seafood poses sustainability issues

What Crenn fails to account for in her pescatarian menu is the complexity associated with seafood production and sustainability concerns. Crenn told CNN Travel that she personally sources ingredients including produce from her farm and fish for her menus but it is unclear what her sourcing protocol is for ensuring that she is choosing sustainable seafood choices. 

The Monterey Bay Aquarium provides a Seafood Watch App to help consumers make informed choices when choosing seafood for a meal. Some of the biggest concerns in aquaculture include overfishing, lack of strong management, or catching and farming in ways that are harmful to marine life and the environment. Monterey Bay Aquarium currently suggests avoiding specific varieties of salmon, tuna, lobster, mahi-mahi, and halibut for example.

Despite attempts to help consumers wade through unsustainable seafood options, fish fraud has become a rampant issue in the industry. Throughout the supply chain, some companies attempt to pass off low-value, processed fish for higher-end cuts like swordfish. Because it’s already been cut up, the buyer has no way of authenticating its origin. On top of that, seafood production has become notoriously associated with slave labor throughout the global supply chain.

As a result, the United Nations has warned that one-third of our oceans are overfished and that fish-consumption rates have reached unsustainable levels. Overfishing is especially a problem in developing nations where many residents struggle to access a reliable steady of nutritious food. For women and children in the developing world, livestock provides not only a source of necessary nutrients but financial security and economic independence. 

Chef Crenn did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Support the case for better meat and bringing more transparency to food production

The Indiegogo campaign to help finish the Sacred Cow documentary and book project launching Summer 2020 launched recently. By contributing to this project, you can help spread the message that better meat is not only possible, but the best way forward for our food system, health, and the environment. Click here to learn more about Sacred Cow or here to contribute.

Lauren Manning, Esq., LL.M., is a cattle farmer, agricultural law professor at the University of Arkansas School of Law, food journalist, and contributor to the forthcoming documentary and book project Sacred Cow: The environmental, nutritional, and ethical case for better meat.