Doner kebab is one of the world’s great snack foods, but despite the cooking method working for diverse proteins such as lamb, beef, and chicken, fish has missed out on the party, as it is too flaky to survive doner’s hallmark rotisserie-style cooking method.
Izmir, Turkey-based Sea Art, founded in November 2021, has solved the problem of how to get fish to stick together as it rotates on a vertical stick, potentially for hours. The company received its European Union registration in mid-April made its global debut from 26 to 28 April at the 2022 Seafood Expo Global in Barcelona, Spain.
“We’re a brand new company,” Sea Art Sales Manager Philip Ogur told SeafoodSource at the expo. “This is our coming-out party.”
Ogur said other companies had tried their hand at formulating a successful fish kebab in Turkey but none have lasted.
“The owner of our company, the inventor of this idea, has been working on it for seven years,” Ogur said. “When he finally succeeded, he [was able to attract] investors who now back it fully and have invested a lot in this business.”
Ogur was tight-lipped about the details of the engineering of the product, but said it consisted of nothing more than 95 percent fish and 5 percent spike mix.
“We have found a way to keep the whole thing up on the spit. Otherwise, it just falls apart,” he said.
The result is an authentic doner flavor and consistency that allows for shredding “easier compared to chicken and meat” – ideal for doner’s typical placement in flatbread or pita to be eaten as a sandwich.
Sea Art is selling its product to the foodservice sector, preloaded onto doner skewers.
“One worker in a restaurant can take it out of the packaging and just put it up on the roller,” Ogur said.
Sea Art is also producing its fish doner – with different flavor choices including sea bream, meagre, and trout – as a cooked, frozen product sold in 300-gram pouches, with contents available to eat after three minutes of microwave heating.
“It’s nice we’re able to have flexibility,” Ogur said. “We have the capacity to ramp up our capacity in whichever side of the market picks up, foodservice or supermarkets.”
Sea Art is currently producing between 50 and 100 metric tons (MT) of final product per month at its Izmir production facility, but Oger said an expansion of its capacity is ongoing and it hopes to reach up to 400 MT within the next three to six months. Ogur said Sea Art is preparing to undergo BRC and IFS certification audits in June and is pursuing GlobalG.A.P. certification. Additionally, it only sources from Aquaculture Stewardship Council-certified farms “in order to guarantee year-round sustainability of our product,” Ogur said.
The company is hoping to land distribution contracts with supermarket chains in Europe, and in particular Germany, with its sizeable Turkish population, Ogur said. Eventually, Sea Art hopes to expand distribution into the United States and Middle East.
“Being the one and only company doing fish doner is good – it’s a big advantage,” Ogur said. “But on the other hand, it brings difficulties. As the first, you’re blazing the trail.”
Photo courtesy of Cliff White/SeafoodSource
