Seafood

A LIST OF popular seafood compiled in the latest issue of Audubon magazine contains a surprise for the Chesapeake region. The two edible varieties in least danger of overfishing and decline, according to the nature magazine's report, are rockfish and crabs. Bluefish, another local staple, is close behind them.Since Maryland clamped down on catching rock and crab in the past decade, those species might still be considered under threat. Indeed, enforcement of catch limits on both species continues.

The weekend fire that destroyed a just-completed Galesville crab house and bar has - for the third time in 2 1/2 years - put on hold a project that many residents opposed. Saturday's three-alarm fire caused $2 million in damage and took more than 80 firefighters over three hours to control, according to fire officials. The restaurant was to have opened in May for private parties, said Charles N. Bassford, owner of Woodfield Seafood. Work on the 200-seat crab house, which is at the same site as Woodfield seafood market, was completed two weeks ago, and nine employees were on staff at the Tenthouse Creek site in the 4700 block of Woodfield Road.

Taku River, Alaska -- Fish counters in green rain slickers patrol a narrow channel of glacier-fed river, keeping close tabs on the thousands of salmon that migrate upstream to spawn. Elsewhere along the coast, observation teams slosh through waterways in waders, carrying rifles to ward off aggressive bears. Still others monitor the migration from low-flying planes, or take inventory at fish weirs and atop counting towers placed strategically throughout the wilds of Alaska as part of an elaborate surveillance of returning fish.

A seafood tradition in Havre de Grace has changed hands. Irene Walsh has sold Price's Seafood, a family business that opened in 1944. "I decided to sell, just like my grandparents did, and it is a bittersweet feeling. The past 20 years have been great, and I'll miss it," she said, "But my parents' health was the deciding factor. They've helped me; now it's time to help them." The new owners have asked Walsh to stay on as long as she can. "Joe and Louise D'Amico are from Avondale, Pa., and want to carry on the same tradition we started in 1944," she said.

If your family had a variety of home-cooked fresh seafood on a regular basis, you probably grew up in another part of the world. Or you like to fantasize about your childhood. Or you're under 30.No, frozen fish sticks and bottled shrimp cocktails don't count. Neither do tuna casseroles."As kids, many of us were exposed to poorly cooked fish at home. Some of it was so bad, it tasted like boiled wool," says Leslie Revsin, author of "Great Fish, Quick" (Doubleday, 1997, $27.50). "People will order seafood in restaurants, but many are not comfortable cooking it. And it's too bad, because it's so delicious.

A zoning battle between two seafood establishments on Ritchie Highway is pitting former fishing colleagues and their ffresh crabs against each other.Owners of Reys seafood establishment, a small crab shack, are defending their right to run their business on a residentially zoned property. The county's Office of Planning and Zoning granted them the right to the "non-comforming zoning use" in February.Opposing their right to exist in that location is the owner of Joe's Seafood, located a few hundred feet south on the same side of Ritchie Highway in Severna Park.

The piped-in music and the decor at Gunning's Seafood Restaurant aren't great, but then Carnegie Hall probably serves a lousy crab cake.Me? I'll take the crab cake at Gunning's. And the rockfish stuffed with crab. And the soft crab sandwich. And the eclair.There are two Gunning's, the original on South Hanover Street in Baltimore that was sold at a foreclosure auction five years ago and one in Hanover, owned by the son of the original Eddie Gunning.Gunning's, the West County version, is the restaurant that progress paved around.

Confused about fish? Just eat it, the government says - unless you're a child, you're pregnant or you're a nursing mother. And even then, you can eat most of it. That's the advice from two scientific teams that released reports yesterday designed to help consumers balance the health benefits of fish against the risks from trace amounts of mercury, PCBs, dioxin and other toxins. The reports say that seafood is not only safe but highly recommended, with a few caveats for youngsters and women of child-bearing age. The Institute of Medicine, a national panel of distinguished physicians and researchers that advises the country on health matters, produced the report in an effort to clear the air after years of studies suggesting that some seafood is not safe.

It's hard to picture it," said Lona Harris of the summertime seafood feasts offered aboard her 46-foot bay-built boat. Harris, who co-owns the Grab-a-Crab Charter Co., said one customer accurately described the onboard atmosphere when he "joked that it was just like his patio, but on the water."

In some ways, it seems unfair to criticize Pisces for what it is: a restaurant that caters to business travelers to whom money is not much of an object. For all I know, that's all it wants to be. The Hyatt Re-gency's upscale dining room is a very good place to relax, have a drink and enjoy a meal at the end of a hard day at somebody else's office. But if you're not on an expense account, you may go into sticker shock when you see the prices. For these people -- and I count myself among them -- the food and service better be darn near perfect.