American Unagi

THE FIRST LARGE-SCALE, LAND-BASED EEL AQUAFARM IN AMERICA IS MAKING HIGH-QUALITY UNAGI MORE ACCESSIBLE AND SUSTAINABLE.

- ANESTES FOTIADES

EACH SPRING, fishermen set nets in Maine's rivers to fish for the state's most valuable catch. No, not the iconic lobster, but tiny glass eels that fetch wholesale prices topping $2,000 per pound. Those baby eels aren't destined for dinner yet. Instead, they're bought by aquaculture farms in Asia and grown to maturity in tanks; each pound of glass eels yields about 1,250 pounds of adult eels, which are then sold back to American consumers.