Kohne Family Seafoods was founded in July 2021. After living in Yakutat, Alaska, a rural Alaskan village, for 10 years we decided to make the cross country move to Edenton, North Carolina, a beautiful small town located in the eastern part of the state. After the move we thought “how great it would be to be able to offer our premium wild caught salmon and halibut direct to the consumer”, so we made it happen. For now, we only offer our fish that we harvest and hand fillet in our small family facility. By cutting out the middleman, we can offer a premium product for less than you would pay at the grocery store for a less than premium product.
We make 2 trips to Alaska per year for 2-3 weeks. First trip is mid-June for sockeye and halibut and our second trip is early September for coho and halibut. These short trips keep fresh product in the freezer and ensures we don’t take more than we can sell. We catch, process, and package only the fish we catch, never sourcing from anyone, this is how we can confidently represent our seafood and ensure quality.
Our halibut is hook and line caught from our fishing vessel F/V Cassidy Ann. We ensure quality by only making day trips out to the bay and every halibut is bled and dressed 30 minutes after being brought on board and iced immediately after dressing. It is then brought back and landed in accordance with federal regulations and belly iced in our facility for 24 hours. Our Salmon is gillnet caught from the Situk River. To maintain quality, we stay on the net and pick every fish out alive, bleed them to flush the blood and then the fish is slushed in ice. Blood, if not removed from the fish, is what causes the fishy taste and fishy smell in poor quality fish. We then truck our salmon 15 miles back to town, and in our small 16x16 DEC approved facility we thoroughly clean each fish and belly ice for 24 hours. We belly ice for 24 hours because we believe allowing the fish to go through rigor naturally offers a higher quality product.
After 24 hours we hand fillet, remove the rib bones, portion, and package every fish. The packages are then placed in a flash freezer that freezes the fish in just 3 hours at -40 degrees. Flash freezing ensures the fish comes out fresh and firm after thawing and also makes it a sashimi grade quality fish, meaning you could eat it raw if you like sushi!! The packages or portions are then packaged in double insulated 50lb wet lock boxes and shipped Alaska Airlines to Raleigh, North Carolina where we then meet the plane and take it to a cold storage in Norfolk, Virginia. From there we can pack for shipment or offer local pick up in Virginia Beach!!