US Foodservice San Francisco Fresh Seafood Program

Deliveries of Fresh Seafood available Monday -Saturday

No Need To Take Notes, It's A Simple Program

Cut off for next day orders 1:00 pm
Friday 1:00 pm cut off for Monday deliveries.
Pricing is emailed weekly and is effective for one week
Fresh Quality Guarantee
Exact Portions Available
Custom Work Done With Advance Notice
For more information please contact Brian Isaeff @ (831) 601-6398

Center of the Plate Tour 2007: Tour of Lusamerica Seafood Plant in Morgan Hill

The tour began around 10am at the Lusamerica Foods processing plant in Morgan Hill. On hand were Center of the Plate Specialists Brian Meier, Rich Bravo, and Steven Salle, Seafood buyer Brian Flaherty,and Brian Isaeff, Territory Manager US Foodservice San Francisco. The hosts were Jonathon Frederico and Tim DeCaminada.

Lusamerica Foods was founded in 1975. Initially, a small importer of specialty foods, Lusamerica slowly evolved into the seafood distribution industry. From its humble beginnings in the mid 70’s, Lusamerica grew steadily, relying on scarce financial resources and the dedication and perseverance of a handful of extremely dedicated employees.

Lusamerica out-hustled the competition by combing the piers, in the early morning hours, looking for the freshest available seafood in order to provide superior quality, service and price.

Today, much has changed in the industry, but the same principles of quality, price and service established in those early days, still drive the organization today. Lusamerica now features a full line of fresh and frozen products, acquired locally and flown daily from all over the world, 6 days a week delivery service and 7 days a week sales office support. With over 40 trucks, tractors, and trailers, equipped with the latest in refrigeration technology that blankets the entire bay area and beyond, Lusamerica is able to expeditiously respond to its customer’s needs. Lusamerica also maintains a comprehensive food safety program, that is independently monitored and certified, in order to provide a wholesome product of superior quality.

Lusamerica has built the necessary infrastructures, based on superior service, and is now poised to maintain and enhance its position in the industry as the "Ultimate in Quality Seafood"

More Lusamerica Center Of The Plate Tour 2007

For as much business as Lusamerica Seafood does in the Bay Area it is surprisingly slim on automation.

Mechanical Salmon Deboner

Much of the processing is still done by hand. One of the exceptions is the mechanical deboner seen to the left processing Salmon. At one end of the line, cutters remove the Salmon heads leaving an "V" shape at the neck. The fish are then hand fed into the deboner. Think double-bladed band saw. The fish is sliced-dropping a filet on each side of the line as the center drops down to a third conveyor line that carries the center carcass to a flash freezer.Meanwhile cutters on each side of the conveyors line up the filets and give slight trimming

Salmon Carcasses Heading For The Blast Freezer

as the filets are run into the mechanical deboner that removes the majority of the bones. On the other side the filets undergo scrutiny, particularly around the collar for final hand-removal of the collar bones.

The center carcasses enter a small room (about the size of my first studio apartment). A spiral conveyer begins at the bottom of the blast freezer room and is slowly spiraled up towards the celing. Within an hour and a half

Frozen Salmon Carcass-Cicles Ready To Pack And Export To Asia

to two hours the carcasses are frozen solid in blocks, packed, and ready to ship for export to Asia.

Back at the filet line, processors pack the finished fillets in poly bags which are then weighed. Weight, origin, processing date, and shipping tags are created at this point. The tags follow the fish for the remainder of their trip to their final destination.

For the US Foodservice San Francisco seafood program the filets are packed in the poly bag, then in insulated foam boxes packed with gel packs rather than ice to protect the quality of the product. The labels are affixed to the outside of the box for easy identification and quality control.

One of the challenges we encounter in the seafood sales business is identifying the crossroads of “Yield and Price”. Jonathon had one of his 30 some year employees demonstrate the different trim yields of a salmon filet. Starting with a whole fish, he took us from an “A” Trim to an “E” Trim. If you had this man on staff I would recommend purchasing whole fish and letting him process them, otherwise take a look at our portion cut program.

Portion are all hand cut, weighed, and packaged for foodservice customers.
Marinated Portion Cuts Are Hand Packed For Foodservice Customers

We recieved a demonstration of various types of cuts, a block cut, bias cut, watched the marinated and portioned filets.

When not processing for the US Foodservice Fresh Seafood Program Jonathon has crews work evenings putting up orders for the retail grocery and retail seafood markets. While the majority of the processing is done by hand, Jonathon demonstrated their retail packaging machine that seals, weighs, prices, and labels the finished filets for various grocery stores.

Joey Chestnut Of San Jose Does It Again

Make it 13 world records now for competitive eater Joey Chestnut. Including,

Sandwiches: 59 Peanut butter cheese sandwiches in 10 minutes on June 19, 2005

Waffles: 18.5 Waffles (8 oz.) in 10 minutes at Waffle House in Atlanta, GA, on September 4, 2005.

Grilled Cheese Sandwiches: 47 sandwiches in 10 minutes at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas, NV on June 10, 2006.

Pork Ribs: 8.4 pounds pork rib meat in 12 minutes at Chinook Winds on July 16, 2006.

Horseshoe Sandwiches: 6 pounds, 5 ounces of horseshoe sandwiches at the Illinois State Fair on August 12, 2006.

Gyoza: 212 chicken and vegetable gyoza during Nisei Week in Little Tokyo in 10 minutes on August 19, 2006.

Pulled Pork: 9 pounds, 6 ounces in 10 minutes in Council Bluffs, IA on September 16, 2006.

Chicken Wings: 182 Wings at Wing Bowl XV in Philadelphia, PA, on February 2, 2007.

Asparagus: 8.6 pounds of tempura-fried asparagus at the Asparagus Festival in Stockton, CA, on April 28, 2007.

Chili: 14 cups in 6 minutes at the Astrodome in Houston, TX on March 30, 2007.

Chicken Wings: 7.05 pounds of Wings in 12 minutes in New York City on May 21, 2007.

Hot Dogs: 66 hot dogs in 12 minutes in Coney Island, Brooklyn, NY on July 4, 2007.

Hamburgers: 103 Krystal Hamburgers in 8 minutes on October 28, 2007.

Currently ranked number one by the international federation of competitive eaters.

Holy Cow! 103 Hamburgers in 8 Minutes

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (AP) -- A competitive eater who has already triumphed at a famous hot dog eating contest swallowed 103 small hamburgers in 8 minutes Sunday to take home $10,000.

Joey Chestnut, 23, of San Jose, Calif., surpassed the previous record of 97 Krystal burgers - 2 1/2 inches square - held by Japan's Takeru Kobayashi, set at last year's Krystal Square Off.

"We never thought we'd see someone anywhere near, let alone past, the century mark when we started the Krystal Square Off in 2004," said Brad Wahl, vice president of marketing for The Krystal Co.

Chestnut beat 12 other contestants. Kobayashi, who won all previous Krystal Hamburger Eating Championships, didn't compete this year because of lingering jaw pain from having a wisdom tooth extracted in June.

The 29-year-old Kobayashi received chiropractic treatment before losing his hot-dog-eating belt in the Nathan's Famous Fourth of July tussle in New York.

Jumpin’ Pumpkins Event To Be Held Sunday November 18th from 5:30 -9:00pm

An evening of food, wine, music, and dancing at the Monterey Conference Center to raise funds and awareness so that the children of the Monterey Peninsula will have the enhanced music, arts, libraries, and special programs they deserve.

Dana Russell, representing the Education Foundation for MPUSD,reported that the Jumpin' Pumpkins event held last November grossed $11,000 and netted over $4,000. He said a $5,000 grant was given to the Lyceum for music programs, $1,000 to Gloria Souzaand Ellen Collard for their MPUSD "Celebrate Americain Song concert,and 25 $100 mini-grants for teachers to spend on their classrooms directly.

For more information visit www.efmpusd.org