The Kennet Crayfish Company has launched the largest processing facility for crayfish in Britain.
The Berkshire-based company uses an eco-friendly, humane method and uses pure, chalk-stream water to handle wild crayfish from the River Kennet.
The brand said most crayfish, a freshwater cousin of lobsters, sold in the UK are imported from fish farms in the ”polluted rivers” of China.
“We wanted to provide the finest crayfish possible and create the largest crayfish processing plant and I think we have done both,” said Andrew Leech, MD of Kennet Crayfish. “We have special licences to process crayfish and to use water from the River Kennet.
“Our bio-secure facility enables stress-free processing of the crayfish to sell chilled or frozen, vastly improving quality of the final product,” he added.
The plant’s storage tanks have a capacity of 3,000kg of crayfish to be held while they are purged.
There are then stress-free crayfish size-grading assemblies and a custom-built, Environment Agency-approved, unit where the crayfish are humanely processed.
The facility also includes vacuum packing, chilling and freezer rooms.
The water used in the facility is from a spring a quarter of a mile away, which is filtered through reed beds before entering the building.
“Signal crayfish are an invasive species and new legislation, which strictly controls the handling and bans the sale of live signal crayfish, meant we had to raise considerable investment to upgrade the existing plant and develop new facilities,” added Leech.
“As a result, we have adapted and created a humane, ethical and environmentally-friendly way of bringing this popular, world-class delicacy to people’s dinner tables.”
No comments yet