
DATE: Sunday, July 20, 1997                 TAG: 9707180511

SECTION: CAROLINA COAST          PAGE: 8    EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Cover Story 

SOURCE: BY LANE DEGREGORY, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:  210 lines

SHRIMPLY IRRESISTIBLEONCE CONSIDERED "WORTHLESS THROW-AWAY BUGS," THE SMALL SHELLFISH NOW FETCH BIG BUCKS ON THE OUTER BANKS.

``Shrimp is the fruit of the sea. You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. There's shrimp-kabobs, shrimp creole, shrimp gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There's pineapple shrimp, lemon shrimp, coconut shrimp, pepper shrimp, shrimp soup, shrimp stew, shrimp salad, shrimp and potatoes, shrimp burger, shrimp sandwich. That's about it.'' - Bubba, from the movie ``Forrest Gump,'' 1994.

Easier to clean than crabs or oysters, with firmer, milder meat than most saltwater fish, shrimp are the most popular seafood sold on the Outer Banks.

Awful Arthur's alone serves at least 100 pounds of the coveted crustaceans a day - about 3,000 shrimp.

One man ate three pounds for dinner at the Kill Devil Hills restaurant. Seamark Foods in Nags Head retails an average of $12,000 worth of shrimp a week.

But 60 years ago, no one in North Carolina ate shrimp. Watermen threw the small shellfish out of their shad nets because they couldn't sell them. The seafood that now fetches as much as $13 per pound was worthless.

``My father'd catch 'em in the sound around here in his pound nets. And he'd dump 'em,'' says Moon Tillett, a 67-year-old Wanchese native who runs a commercial fishing company. ``Didn't nobody like to eat 'em.

``We just called 'em `old bugs.' ''

In 1939, Tillett saw someone eat a shrimp for the first time. Bonnie (cq) Spencer, who became Tillett's father-in-law, picked the pink bugs out of his pound net in Englehard and took them home. He boiled them, ``like the boys fixed all their other fish back then,'' Tillett says. ``And he liked 'em. So he started telling his friends to keep the dang bugs for themselves and go ahead and sell all the shad.''

Tillett started catching shrimp commercially in 1944 - and by then, a good market had been established to sell them. At age 14, he ran a small boat out of Englehard. ``There were one or two guys to a boat. Must've been 1,000 boats all up and down the Pamlico Sound,'' he says. ``Shrimp were so thick then, we'd get 300 to 500 pounds in one drag of a 20-foot net.''

Today, Tillett's seafood company runs two 75-foot commercial shrimp trawlers that each pull four 60-foot nets. Watermen drag the nets along the ocean floor scraping shrimp, crabs and small fish into the mesh. Four men board each boat on Sunday afternoon, catch shrimp all week, and return to Roanoke Island sometime Friday.

``We'll get about 3,000 pounds a week per boat on average,'' says Tillett, whose seafood company also buys shrimp from other commercial fishermen. ``One year, not too far back, we sold shrimp right to Red Lobster restaurants. About 10,000 pounds a week.''

Some of Tillett's shrimp still goes directly to restaurants. Darrell's in Manteo buys from his boats. And seafood shops such as Whalebone and Austin's in Nags Head also sell shrimp Tillett's trawlers bring in from around the Outer Banks.

Awful Arthur's owner Jay Whitehead says he tries to buy as much locally caught shrimp as possible. Most of what he sells during summer comes from Etheridge Seafood in Wanchese. ``But not as many people shrimp now as they did when we opened 14 years ago,'' Whitehead says. ``Used to be the shrimpers themselves brought the shrimp to my back door. Now, mostly, I go through wholesale seafood dealers.

``It's harder to get local shrimp now. And you'll pay more money for them than ever before,'' says the restaurateur, who sells spiced, steamed shrimp for $13.95 per pound. ``But there's never a night that goes by when I don't sell at least 25 pounds of shrimp - even in the dead of winter.

``Just about everybody loves shrimp.''

The Outer Banks are the northernmost habitat for shrimp. More populated fishing grounds are down south, off the coasts of South Carolina, Georgia and Louisiana. North Carolina's shrimping season runs from mid-July through late September.

Tillett estimates that about 25 percent of shrimp consumed on the Outer Banks actually are caught in the area. Much of the locally sold shrimp was raised on South American fish farms and shipped thousands of miles by plane. Tillett also sends a lot of his North Carolina shrimp to processing plants in Florida and Texas where workers peel, de-vein and bread them for frozen food companies like Mrs. Pauls.

``Unlike oysters or other shellfish, shrimp freeze well and keep great,'' Tillett says. ``I've had some in my freezer two years and I can't tell 'em from fresh once they're cooked. That's probably another reason they sell so well.''

Shrimp spawn in freshwater rivers and streams then swim into saltier waters of the sounds and, eventually, the ocean. ``They always go south,'' Tillett says. ``And they each only live about a year.''

Shrimp sizes vary depending on how old they are, what kind they are and where they were caught. Shrimp found in the sound typically are younger - and smaller - than those that swim in the ocean. Trawlers travel up to a mile offshore in the Atlantic to catch shrimp up to 7 or 8 inches long.

State-licensed seafood dealers are the only people who are legally allowed to sell shrimp. Commercial fishing licenses are required to catch shrimp. But five years ago, an Outer Banks waterman began taking tourists on shrimping trips.

Capt. Rick Caton's Custom Sound Charters give everyone the chance to snag shrimp in a net and see how the tiny creatures look when they're still alive.

``I was running an offshore charter boat - you know, where all the guys go to catch those big trophy fish,'' Caton said. ``And I kept hearing how they wished there was something they could take the wife and kids on. So I started this family trip on the calmer sound waters where kids won't get seasick - and they can learn a lot about fishing.''

Caton's charters are family-oriented on two levels. His trips are geared to children as well as adults. And his 10-year-old son, Patrick, is the mate - unfurling the net, helping cull through the catch and even de-heading all the shrimp for his dad's customers.

``Some people just don't like to pop their heads off,'' Patrick Caton said, flinging off the beady-eyed heads with his thumb. ``So I fix the shrimp up for 'em before we get back to the dock.''

Robin Roland and her family booked a shrimp trip last week. They spent about five hours on the water dragging nets and sorting through thousands of 3-inch fish to find the shrimp. They caught three or four pounds of shrimp, four huge striped bass and a big basket of blue crabs.

``We've been out on the ocean fishing for Spanish mackerel before. But we've never done anything like this,'' said Roland, a 33-year-old vacationer from Mt. Airy, Md., who brought her father and two children on the $330 trip.

``This is fun and educational - and a lot of hard work,'' Roland said, her face turning scarlet with the strain of hoisting the heavy net on board. ``Now I can see why shrimp cost what they do. These will taste much sweeter, though, since I've put all the effort into catching them myself.''

Since she was staying in a hotel room without refrigerator or stove, Roland planned to freeze her catch in a rental locker at Capt. Marty's Tackle Shop in Nags Head, then take it home to make shrimp creole - her favorite dish. Seamark Foods also steams shrimp for people who catch their own. And dozens of places from Corolla through Ocracoke sell raw, steamed or spiced shrimp - ready to cook or consume.

Awful Arthur's sells shrimp fried, sauteed, in sauces over pasta and in salads. But the most popular way to eat shrimp by far, Whitehead says, is steamed and spiced. It takes his cooks two minutes to steam a pound of shrimp in a convection steamer. The process takes a little longer at home. But Whitehead cautions not to overcook shrimp.

``That's the biggest mistake people make with seafood - cooking it too long,'' Whitehead says. ``If you put shrimp in a pot of water, then turn the heat on, just let the water come to a boil - then cut the heat off right then. You can still let the shrimp sit in the pot of hot water for a few more minutes and it'll cook a bit more.

``But as soon as they turn pink, that's enough.''

Whitehead also warns consumers not to be fooled by bargains of head-on shrimp. Although the price is sometimes 25 to 30 percent lower than it is for already de-headed shrimp, he said you lose at least one-third of the weight after popping off the shrimp heads. ``You also have to de-head shrimp when they're fairly fresh or they'll start to decay from the head back,'' he says.

The brownish-black vein that many people scrape out of the backs of shrimp actually is harmless to eat, Whitehead says. It is the shrimp's filtration system that cleans sand and waste products out of its system. But it looks a lot worse than it tastes.

``If you have to get it out, those plastic de-veiners do work,'' Whitehead says, referring to the ones supermarkets sell. ``Just straighten the shrimp out first. Then slide it down the back of the shell from where the head was down to the tail.''

Tillett says his favorite way to eat shrimp is fried in egg batter. But he recommends soaking shrimp in milk for a half-hour or so before cooking them. ``That'll tenderize 'em, and it won't change the flavor one bit,'' he says.

Other Outer Bankers pour a bottle of beer into the water they're going to boil the shrimp in. They say it softens them. And it certainly adds flavor.

``That's one of the best things about shrimp - they're so mild you can spice 'em any way you want,'' says Seamark Foods Seafood Manager James Burch, who sells heads-on local shrimp for $3.99 per pound and steamed, peeled, de-veined, de-headed, read-to-eat cocktail shrimp for $12.99 per pound at the Nags Head supermarket.

``Shrimp is by far our biggest seller,'' Burch says. ``It has a great texture and flavor. And even people who won't eat other seafood seem to love it.'' ILLUSTRATION: STAFF PHOTOS BY NHAT MEYER

From left, Robyn roland, her son John, 6, and daughter Becka, 11 all

from Marylnad, size up their catch of shrimp, crab and fish aboard

the Free Agent. Patrick Caton, 10, far right, the first mate for his

father, Rick Caton, watches over the catch.

Below: Patrick Caton takes the heads off of shrimp soon after

catching them to keep them fresh.

Rob Dorbad, a Raw Oyster bartender at Awful Arthurs scoops out some

seasoning to put on the shrimp - in the basket.

BUBBA'S BEER-BATTER SHRIMP

Source: Ladies' Home Journal

[Complete text of this recipe can be found on the microfilm for this

date.]