the tuna was tuna free, but no one noticed

In March 2021, Netflix will release the documentary seaspiracy from. It is a brutal indictment of the global fishing industry, which points out, among other things, tuna fishing as one of the reasons that the quality of the oceans is deteriorating at an alarming rate. Especially among young people and on social media, the fishing industry is equated with the already denounced factory farming.

Coincidentally, two weeks earlier, the first cans of vegetable tuna from Seasogood were placed on the shelves of almost nine hundred Albert Heijns. It may be hidden away in a corner of the already not-so-remarkable fish cannery, but they are there. Founders Dennis Favier (38) and Michael Luesink (34) squeeze their hands. For them is seaspiracy ‘the best commercial we’ll never have to pay’.

For many entrepreneurs it is quite difficult to get a pilot at the largest supermarket chain in the Netherlands, let alone to get a product on the shelf in all branches. Things are different for Favier and Luesink. In November 2020, they will knock on Albert Heijn’s door with their pitch and a prototype of the cans of fish-free tuna.

The gist of their story: tuna will be so overfished within a few years that it can no longer be sold in cans. Therefore, making the switch now is the only logical decision. Albert Heijn agrees. “They responded positively to say the least,” Favier says. “Within four months they wanted our cans in all the stores.”

Race against the clock

The entrepreneurs had counted on enthusiasm, but delivering so quickly was a ‘race against the clock’, says Luesink: ‘We had to produce tens of thousands of cans from scratch, while we had not even set up the company yet and the supply chain still had to be set up. .’ With pain and effort Seasogood managed to deliver. Nowadays, the cans are also available at Plus and delivery service Crisp.

In addition to being entrepreneurs, Favier and Luesink are above all food lovers. Luesink spent his student years in the kitchens of starred restaurants, while Favier worked as a student in cooking schools, among other things. Both studied Food Innovation at HAS Den Bosch, where they learned to experiment with texture and taste. They loved the food industry, but didn’t see themselves in the kitchen until retirement.

After spending several years in the same food innovation circuit, they found each other in the desire to market a fish substitute. It was the logical next step, now that high-quality meat substitutes such as the Beyond Burger are winning over the consumer.

The choice for tuna was an easy one, says Luesink: ‘We started with tuna because it is one of the most commonly eaten and most overfished species of fish. Moreover, tuna is consumed all over the world, so it will be easy to export to other countries in the future.’

Algae, seaweed and sea buckthorn berry

Favier adds: ‘Tuna is a large predatory fish. When things go bad with tuna, entire ecosystems get out of balance.’ The most impact and the best revenue model lies with tuna, they decided.

The primary ingredient of the fish-free tuna is soybeans. They are grown in Serbia, because the founders ‘cannot get it sold’ to consumers if their environmentally friendly product is at the expense of the Amazon forest. In Serbia, the beans are processed into a protein powder.

In a factory in Gelderland, the powder is subjected to variable pressure and different temperatures in a screw meter wide, turning the powder into a flaky mass with a fish-like texture.

With a combination of, among other things, algae, seaweed and sea buckthorn berry, the taste of tuna is added in yet another factory. The exact combination is a secret. “Just like Coca-Cola. Everyone in the chain knows something, but nobody knows the whole recipe’, says Luesink. ‘People are not averse to cheating in the food industry.’

The result of this process is something quite similar to one of the most eaten fish in Europe.

Too…fishy

Luesink and Favier are based in Den Bosch, where they perfect the recipe from their kitchen laboratory. The cans in the supermarket today already contain the fourth version of the product. Each time they produce prototypes with just a different flavor combination, a new ingredient or a different texture.

In their laboratory it is not the test tubes that rule, but the taste buds. ‘We are actually endlessly testing and tasting’, says Luesink. That can be quite intense, says Favier. ‘If you have to taste thirty cans of tuna in a row, you sometimes don’t remember. Certainly at ten o’clock in the morning.’ Taste tests are then done with thirty to one hundred tasters. If they find the result successful, the new version can go into the supermarket.

The biggest change Seasogood has made is a strange one. ‘So it turns out that when people buy a new product, people have a persistent tendency to take a bite right out of the can. Nobody does that with real tuna, except bodybuilders’, says Favier. I don’t like the taste of a spoonful of fish-free tuna. ‘It was too…fishy’, says Luesink. ‘But when people use it in a dish for which it is intended, they think it’s great.’ However, they adapt the recipe so that the first taste experience is better. It illustrates how consumers relate to plant-based substitutes: curious but suspicious.

Secretly tuna-free

In March, Seasogood hired a caterer that serves tuna salad sandwiches. The tuna on those sandwiches was secretly swapped with the fish-free tuna in one order of 100 pieces. Nobody noticed. This was reason enough for the caterer to only serve vegetable tuna from now on.

Tuna is not the end station for Seasogood. A prototype salmon fillet is already in the laboratory steam oven. Luesink and Favier also want to design vegetable prawns. Therein lies a new challenge. Favier: ‘Shrimp have a crazy texture. The question is how do you snap and then you have to get them in the right shape. Otherwise the consumer will not know how to cook with it.’

But, says Luesink confidently, ‘technically anything is possible. The only question is whether we will succeed before the competition.’