How sea cucumbers fished from the North Atlantic are making their way onto the plates of enthusiastic diners in China and North America.

Sea cucumbers are broadly misunderstood by North Americans.

Some people are put off by their appearance; others think they’re vegetables. It’s not surprising. If you aren’t aware of their traditional role in Chinese cuisine or their nutritional value, it’s reasonable to make assumptions about the slimy, tubular blobs lurking around on the sea floor. If we get scientific about it, those blobs are echinoderms—part of the same family as starfish and sea urchins—and in Atlantic Canada, the cucumaria frondosa, also known as orange-footed sea cucumbers, are the dominant species.

While North America largely ignores the potential contained in these slippery creatures, many countries have celebrated them for hundreds of years. Sea cucumbers are a delicacy in several Asian countries, including Malaysia, Japan and Korea, but they’re most commonly eaten in China. There, they’re quite literally a food fit for royalty—having gained popularity during the Ming Dynasty, when they started showing up on palace tables. They’re also known for their nutritional value, antioxidants and anti-inflammatory properties.

“In traditional Chinese medicine we consider sea cucumber a medicine food,” said Frank Zeng, the sales representative at Atlantic Sea Cucumber, a sea cucumber processor in Nova Scotia. “For people who have had surgeries, or just delivered babies, or are having cancer treatment, Chinese doctors will suggest they take one cucumber a day to help the body recover.”

According to Zeng, these factors (along with the fact sea cucumbers are more of a rarity in China) mean that sea cucumbers harvested in China can go for as much as $1,000 a pound. “It’s really expensive for people to have sea cucumber in China,” said Zeng. “So it’s normally saved for Spring Festival or other big festivals.”

 

While sea cucumbers have been overfished in many areas of the world, they’re relatively abundant here. Fisheries and Oceans Canada maintains modest fishing quotas for the orange-footed sea cucumber, so the supply should remain stable in the long term. It’s worth noting that quotas don’t always prevent overfishing, however. Yucatán, Mexico, for example, has banned sea cucumber fishing since 2013. But in 2020 alone, almost 1,600 tons of sea cucumber were illegally fished.

Canadian sea cucumber processors can sell their product at a much more affordable price, making China a natural—and lucrative—market. Atlantic Sea Cucumbers serves this market by selling dried sea cucumber products under its Roslyn brand; its sister company, AKSO Marine Biotech, sells health products—including sea cucumber capsules and seal oil supplements.

Though the international market can be lucrative, Atlantic Sea Cucumber primarily focuses on Canada and the U.S. Unfortunately, sea cucumber doesn’t have the same cultural history here, and there’s a lack of education about its nutritional benefits, so it’s a much more challenging market to break into. “That’s the main barrier for the North American market,” said Zeng. “Local people are not familiar with it. That’s why every time we go to Toronto, or to Vancouver for exhibition shows, people are surprised.”

It’s more than just unfamiliarity, however. Preparing dried sea cucumbers requires two or three days of rehydrating, which is prohibitive in a society where the meal kit market is worth about a billion U.S. dollars. That’s where AKSO Marine Biotech comes in—with capsules for those who want the health benefits without the prep work.

With enough education and marketing, there could be an opportunity for substantial growth in North America, where Atlantic Sea Cucumber sells its dried sea cucumbers for $79.99 a pound, through Costco and Amazon.

 

Traditional Ingenuity

A sea cucumber’s journey from ocean to plate is a long one, which is why, even in Canada, they’re on the pricier side. For Atlantic Sea Cucumber, it starts with a broker. “Quite a few companies are licensed to do the fishing, so it’s easy,” said Zeng. “We work with brokers that have access to all kinds of seafood.”

The North Atlantic is a sea cucumber haven, and it’s fished in many places, from Atlantic Canada to as far away as Iceland. It’s unclear where Atlantic Sea Cucumber sources its raw products, as they indicated their sourcing practices are “commercially sensitive and not for public release.” As a result, we can’t confirm how long the sea cucumber remains fresh-frozen.

It’s also proven difficult to gather details on shipping and logistics for sea cucumber in general. While many attempts were made to contact various third-party experts to discuss this topic, no one was available. It is clear, however, that for transportation and storage, it’s critical to maintain a consistent temperature to protect the quality of the product.

“Once it arrives, we store it in our freezer until we process it,” explained Tarunjit Sheemar, the company’s food safety supervisor. “Then, every day, we bring out the product we need for the next day and thaw it in seawater overnight.”

Atlantic Sea Cucumber uses lightly chlorinated seawater to reduce natural microbial growth and prevent spoilage. Once the sea cucumber is thawed, it’s loaded onto a conveyer belt where a small team of PPE-clad workers gut the sea cucumbers and slice them using one of two different methods: a butterfly cut, which runs the length of the sea cucumber; or a whole cut, where they remove the head and pull the guts out through the hole.

 

After that, the sea cucumbers go into a steam cooker—a differentiator for Atlantic Sea Cucumber, as it helps the sea cucumbers retain more nutrients. “There are a lot of active components inside sea cucumber,” said Delphine Xiang, the company’s sales and marketing coordinator. “If you boil for too long, the nutrients might be lost… because the main bioactive components of sea cucumber are water-soluble.”

Next, a conveyor belt rolls the sea cucumbers into a cooling pot filled with seawater, and when that’s done, another couple of workers check the sea cucumbers over. This is part of Atlantic Sea Cucumbers’ quality control process, where the sea cucumbers are weighed and the workers rack them to prepare them for the hot air dryer.

“Drying is a critical control point because if the sea cucumbers are not dried well, we might not kill all the micro-bacteria and microorganisms,” said Sheemar, who adds that the company has found the optimal drying time through extensive R&D efforts. “There is a thermostat outside the dryer that gives us a constant temperature all the time. The thermostat is checked regularly, and if there’s any deviation [from the specified temperature], we take action right away.”

Where many seafood supply chain innovations happen in transportation and logistics, with sea cucumber, drying is the truly innovative part. “Drying and rehydrating sea cucumbers is a traditional [Chinese] preservation method that extends their shelf life significantly without needing refrigeration,” said Xiang. “Historically, this method facilitated long-distance trade and ensured the year-round availability of sea cucumbers.”

When Xiang said shelf life is extended, she’s not kidding. Dried sea cucumber can have a shelf life of up to five years (but check the expiry date on the bag before you eat them).

 

Going to Market

After spending time in the hot air dryer, the sea cucumbers are sorted into one of three grades: A, B and Flowers. A-grade sea cucumbers are high-quality and nice-looking (for sea cucumbers, anyway), and B-grade sea cucumbers are still high-quality, but… well, let’s just say they probably won’t win any aquatic beauty pageants, even in the sea cucumber category. Flowers are tentacles, which are also edible.

Then, it’s time to package the dried sea cucumber into one-pound packages—which is another whole endeavour because Atlantic Sea Cucumber currently sells its Roslyn brand in a range of countries, including China, Canada and North America, and each country has its own packaging and labelling requirements.

“The only common factor is the weight—it’s the same for all countries,” said Zeng. “The printing is different because in Canada, we need to use French and English, and we use a specific nutritional fact template that meets the requirements here. For the U.S. bags, we just put English and traditional Chinese because we want to attract more Chinese customers at Costco.”

Atlantic Sea Cucumber ships directly to Amazon and Costco, but for the Chinese market, it ships by ocean and air, depending on the buyer’s needs. “The dried sea cucumber usually takes a month on the ocean,” said Zeng. “The temperature might vary a little bit, but because it’s dried, the quality doesn’t change.”

 

From Ocean to Entrée

If you know where to look, fresh, frozen and dried sea cucumbers can be purchased online, in stores or markets, or through a supplier. Eric Yeung, owner of four May Garden Chinese restaurants in Nova Scotia, relies on suppliers. He also mostly sticks to dried sea cucumber, because it’s easier to work with—and, according to Yeung, it just tastes better.

“We put it in the water, let it soak for a couple days,” said Yeung. “Sometimes they need longer. It just depends on the quality and what they look like. You’ve got to keep changing the water every day until they’re soft and tender.”

Even though the prep is easy, it still takes a long time, so it’s not something Yeung can put on his regular menu. However, it can be ordered by special request if he has enough lead time. “If a customer orders it, we just tell them, okay, in two or three days you can come get your order,” said Yeung. “Mostly, though, they still eat in the restaurant, because the look is pretty and the taste is better. And not many Chinese restaurants do this.”

Most of the sea cucumber requests come through Yeung’s two banquet restaurants. Outside of festivals, sea cucumbers are typically reserved for special occasions like birthdays, anniversaries and weddings.

Fortunately, after all that prep work, sea cucumber dishes can be quite simple. “For a couple of dishes, they don’t really need anything,” said Yeung. “It’s just one big sea cucumber. After we cook it, we just put some vegetables beside it on the plate and then add a sauce.”

Then, finally, it’s time to eat.