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Decades-old fish sauce at abandoned factory in Canada finally being removed

defector.com

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Re: Decades-old fish sauce at abandoned factory in Canada finally being removed

#61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of "rotten" I should have probably used "fermented". They're dark brown, not dry but not in a liquid, individual anchovies that are starting to fall apart. They smell like a stronger version of fish sauce.

This but also with pepper corns? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23QDS0xclw4

Yeah, rough-ground peppercorn.

Re: Decades-old fish sauce at abandoned factory in Canada finally being removed

#62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think he was targeted but he met the reality of bureaucracy. One agency actually funded him and approved the building and allowed him to operate for 11 years. Another agency said you can’t operate or sell because of the growing mold. Another agency said dump the forbidden fish sauce in the sewer. Another agency said to bury it.

Canadian bureaucracy around food is at times insane (and vaguely racist). Just look up '1985 Jamaican patty wars'.

From cbc:

>In 1985, the Canadian government tried to stop Jamaican bakeries and restaurants from using the term "beef patty."

>At the time, Canada's Meat Inspection Act classified a beef patty as what goes in a hamburger. It could contain only meat and seasoning and it couldn't be encased in dough or a crust. Therefore, a Jamaican patty — widely known as a flaky pastry with a spiced beef filling — didn't meet the criteria.

That actually vaguely seems reasonable? Especially in contexts where there's only text to go by (eg. on a menu), people might actually be confused.

Re: Decades-old fish sauce at abandoned factory in Canada finally being removed

#64
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canadian bureaucracy around food is at times insane (and vaguely racist). Just look up '1985 Jamaican patty wars'.

From cbc: >In 1985, the Canadian government tried to stop Jamaican bakeries and restaurants from using the term "beef patty." >At the time, Canada's Meat Inspection Act classified a beef patty as what goes in a hamburger. It could contain only meat and seasoning and it couldn't be encased in dough or a crust. Therefore, a Jamaican patty — widely known as a flaky pastry with a spiced beef filling — didn't meet the cri…

It’s not that it’s unreasonable to think the word “patty” is ambiguous —it’s that it’s unreasonable to spend tax dollars on saving people from that ambiguity

Re: Decades-old fish sauce at abandoned factory in Canada finally being removed

#65
I recall reading there were zoning laws in the classical era about where you could manufacture garum (the Roman fermented fish condiment). Here's one attributable example I could find, from the tail end of the Eastern empire. This is 2.4.22 in the Hexabiblos (1344–1345) ["–" sic] of the Byzantine jurist, Constantine Harmenopoulos of Thessalonica; it legislates a ~450–600-meter exclusion zone (three stadia).

The archive.org page I linked is in Byzantine Greek with a Latin translation. I've quoted the Greek part here, and I used Deepseek V4 Flash for OCR-cleanup and machine translation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantine_Harmenopoulos

https://archive.org/details/constharmenopul00heimgoog/page/2... ("Ἐπαρχιχὸν ΠΕΡῚ ΓΑΡΕΨΩΝ" / "Edictum DE GARI COCTORIBUS")

> "22. Ἡ τέχνη τῶν γαρεψῶν καὶ ἡ τῶν τυροποιῶν οὐ τὴν τυχοῦσαν ποιεῖ τοῖς παρακειμένοις βλάβην· πολλὴ γὰρ ἡ ἀπ᾽ αὐτῆς ἀτμὶς δυσώδης τε ἀμέτρως ἐστὶ καὶ ἐπιβλαβὴς ἐπὶ πολὺ διάστημα. Ὅθεν χρὴ τοὺς τοιούτους ἅπασαν μὲν πόλιν μὴ οἰκεῖν μηδὲ κώμην. Εἰ δὲ χρεία τούτων εἴη πρὸς τὰς χρήσεις τῶν πόλεων καὶ τῶν κωμῶν, ἀφεστάναι στάδια τούτους δεῖ τρία. Εἰδέναι δὲ χρὴ ὡς ταῦτα πάντα τὰ προειρημένα ἐπὶ τῶν ἐκ νέου κατασκευαζόντων εἴρηται· εἰ δὲ χάρται εἰσὶ παλαιοὶ ἢ καὶ δουλεία τις προλαβοῦσα, κεχρῆσθαι δεῖ τοῖς ἐξ ἀρχῆς περὶ αὐτῶν συμπεφωνημένοις."

> "The craft of the salt‑fish merchants and that of the cheesemakers causes no ordinary harm to those nearby; for the vapour arising from it is exceedingly foul‑smelling and harmful over a great distance. Hence such persons ought not to dwell in any city or village. But if there should be need of them for the uses of the cities and villages, they must keep a distance of three stades [~555 m]. And it must be known that all these aforestated things have been said concerning those who set up (such establishments) anew; but if there exist old charters or some prior servitude (i.e., an established legal right or prescriptive practice), one must abide by what was originally agreed concerning them."

Re: Decades-old fish sauce at abandoned factory in Canada finally being removed

#66
post #52
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution to pollution is dilution was a philosophy prior to modern environmental protection laws, which were a reaction to the fact that we were absolutely destroying all kinds of ecosystems, even when we thought we were just diluting toxins down to nothing.

This stuff is barely pollution. Everything there is a natural part of the environment and biological processes. Literally the only issue here is the concentration of it. Dumping it in the ocean is an ideal course of action. Failing that it should be dumped out in the wilderness, not in bags, but just on the ground. It may have a short-term change in the local environment, but long term it's fertilizer. The risk of du…

> ”It may have a short-term change in the local environment, but long term it's fertilizer.”

The fish would make for great fertilizer, but the salt would not. High salt concentrations will kill many plants and probably would stick around in the soil for a long time.

Re: Decades-old fish sauce at abandoned factory in Canada finally being removed

#67
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution to pollution is dilution was a philosophy prior to modern environmental protection laws, which were a reaction to the fact that we were absolutely destroying all kinds of ecosystems, even when we thought we were just diluting toxins down to nothing.

Is fish sauce a toxin?

It's the dosage that makes the poison. If you dumped it all in the ocean in a single spot then yes, it would probably kill the local ecosystem.

Re: Decades-old fish sauce at abandoned factory in Canada finally being removed

#68
Can't remember where i've read that nor even if it's a real thing or not so do take the following with caution.

I think Roman Empire garum (fish sauce) factories where one of, if not the first thing in known history to trigger lawmakers to set a minimum distance from factories to residential areas (something like 1 mile iirc).

Re: Decades-old fish sauce at abandoned factory in Canada finally being removed

#70
post #2

Since this is just salted, fermented fish, which the scientist in the article claims he would like to taste, why does it need to be buried in plastic? Why not slowly pour it into a sewer, over the course of several months?

From the linked Eater article: >Perhaps the most promising and most discouraging event for the factory happened in 2016. That year, the provincial government approved a cleanup plan, and a private company began the process. But the cleanup was halted soon after it started when it became clear that the contractors were dumping several dozen vats of rotten fish sauce directly into the ocean. According to Ryan, the prov…

In 2016, they dumped forty bats into the ocean but Environment Canada did some testing on the sludge and found that it would kill fish within five minutes. The environmental cost would have been obscene - it’s acidic, extremely salty and has little to no oxygen. This would have been a disaster. It’s why they’re mixing it with peat moss before they bury it - they don’t want it to touch the water table.

I don’t really see what the problem is with letting scientists work.

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