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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

ocean hugger

Ocean Hugger Will Re-enter the Plant-Based Seafood Space Via a Partnership With Nove Foods

Plant-based seafood maker Ocean Hugger is relaunching via a partnership with Thailand-based Nove Foods, according to a statement on the Ocean Hugger website.

The venture comes after after the pandemic forced Ocean Hugger, which previously sold products primarily to foodservice businesses, to cease operations.

Part of Ocean Hugger’s plight in 2020 was the fact that the company’s plant-based tuna and eel products were primarily used for sushi. But in the U.S., most consumers get sushi either at restaurants or at prepared foods counters. The pandemic devastated both those avenues, leaving Ocean Hugger with little choice but to close up shop for a while. 

However, the company came back in September 2020 with an announcement that it planned to re-enter the plant-based protein market, though no further details were given at the time.

Now, the plan is to launch “an expanded portfolio” of plant-based seafood products via a joint venture with Nove Foods, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of sustainable food manufacturer NRF. New York-based Ocean Hugger’s mission to produce a more ethical, environmentally friendly seafood is in line with NRF’s overall business, which has extended in recent years to include plant-based foods and functional foods.

The plant-based seafood market is still fairly wide open in terms of opportunity for companies. While New Wave Foods makes a plant-based shrimp analog and Good Catch has a “tuna” product on the market, there are not yet plant-based seafood companies that have the status that, say, Beyond or Impossible do with with beef analogs.

Ocean Hugger’s re-entry into the market gives the company another shot at becoming such a company. The company plans to release its expanded portfolio into retail and foodservice businesses later in 2021. Whether that will be in the U.S., Asia, or Europe is still to be determined. 

Ocean Hugger Has Big Plans to Re-Enter the Plant-Based Seafood Market

Plant-based seafood startup Ocean Hugger said this week it is in the midst of planning a relaunch, according to an interview with Food Navigator. 

In June, the New York-based company had to cease operations, citing the COVID-19 pandemic as the reason. Up to that point, Ocean Hugger ran a promising business selling its “tuna” and “eel” products to foodservice businesses. As we’re all too aware these days, the foodservice industry has been one of the hardest hit by the pandemic, and Ocean Hugger found itself facing no sales and had to stop operations.

Now, however, it appears the company is planning its comeback. An update from August 31 on the Ocean Hugger website states that, “Over the coming months, we will be exploring paths to relaunch bigger and better than ever.”

How the company plans to do that is under wraps for now. Food Navigator notes that new developments should “enable the business to relaunch next year.” Co-founder David Benzaquen suggested to the publication that Ocean Hugger is exploring ways to re-enter the market and also hinted at new products. He gave no further details.

It’s reasonable to imagine that, with the right business model, Ocean Hugger will be successful in its attempt to relaunch. Investment in alternative proteins has already reached over $1.1 billion in 2020, and both plant- and cell-based seafood startups have made many a headline recently. General Mills invested $32 million Good Catch at the beginning of 2020. BlueNalu, which grows cell-based seafood in bioreactors, nabbed a $20 million investment in February. More recently, S2G ventures said it would be investing $100 million in seafood and ocean health startups including alt-protein.

Ocean Hugger has so far raised $500,000 from a funding round in 2019. Benzaquen said in his interview this week that seafood is one of the most obvious areas of animal protein to disrupt from a sustainability and animal welfare angle. If others agree, that investment figure for Ocean Hugger could go up significantly in the future.

Plant-Based Sushi Startup Ocean Hugger Foods Falls Victim to COVID-19, Ceases Operations

COVID-19 has claimed another food-related business, this time plant-based seafood startup Ocean Hugger Foods.

The company, which had raised $500,000 in late 2019, had been gaining traction through much of 2019 for vegan sushi products as it reeled in wins at select Whole Foods and quick service restaurants such as Ahipoki.

But once COVID-19 hit, the bulk of the company’s customers closed down for months and, as a result, Ocean Hugger couldn’t survive.

The company disclosed the news via an open letter on its website. From the letter:

Due to the COVID-19 health crisis our world is facing, and the fact that our company sells exclusively to foodservice customers (such as university and corporate cafeterias, and restaurants) who are suffering greatly during this time, it is with tremendous sadness that we must report that Ocean Hugger Foods must cease operations.

The company had launched its second product at last year’s National Restaurant Show, a vegan eel sushi (unami). The product followed its original ahimi (the company’s plant-based “tuna” sushi).

While some food companies that rely heavily on food service were able to sustain themselves through ramped up restaurant delivery or by pivoting to direct to consumer channels, Ocean Hugger didn’t benefit much from either of these alternative models. Sushi is the type of food most prefer to eat fresh and in-venue, and it certainly isn’t the type of product that could be delivered direct to consumer through order-by-mail.

While Ocean Hugger wasn’t the only company with plant-based sushi alternatives, they were maybe the most well known and seemed to be on a good trajectory before COVID-19.

With restaurants in the US and other markets slowly reopening, hopefully other startups who have been struggling like Ocean Hugger can start to sell their products again. However, with some markets starting to see an increasing number of COVID cases as people start heading to restaurants, chances are we’ll probably see some future COVID-related casualties.

Later, California Rolls. New Vegan Sushi Options are Trying to Mimic Raw Fish

For most vegetarians, sushi options are limited to all-too-often lackluster California rolls. Maybe a tamago egg, if they’re lucky.

But as of late, vegetarians and vegans — or consumers who are just concerned about ocean overfishing — have several new options to swipe through their soy sauce. Ones composed entirely of plants, but which are made to fool you into thinking you’re eating raw fish.

Photo: Ima.

First up is a new product from Ima, a plant-based food company. Just last week Ima released a sushi roll with a salmon substitute made of konjac, an Asian root vegetable with a gelatinous texture. Ima has twelve other products, including a vegan sushi burrito (sushi-rito?), but this is their first offering that’s really trying to imitate fish. We can’t speak to the taste, but the look is spot-on. Ima’s plant-based sushi is sold in U.K. retailers Planet Organic and Sourced Market.

For those who are more into tuna, Ocean Hugger Foods has “ahimi”: an alternative to raw ahi tuna made out of tomatoes, which they process to mimic the taste and texture of raw fish. Ahimi is available in roughly 90 sushi/poke restaurants and grocery retailers (including Whole Foods) across the U.S.

Photo: Ocean Hugger Foods.

I got to sample sushi with ahimi a few months ago at the Alternative Protein Show in San Francisco. While it hit the same basic flavor notes as sushi — savory, clean, and just a tiny bit sweet — I wouldn’t say it would fool me into thinking it’s actually made of tuna. But compared to a bland California roll, ahimi sushi is light years more exciting.

Plant-based seafood innovation isn’t just happening on the raw side. Good Catch recently launched their plant-based tuna at Whole Foods, Sophie’s Kitchen has a canned “toona” made of konjac (the same ingredient in Ima), and New Wave Foods has a vegan shrimp product.

Of course, all these plant-based fish might become irrelevant once cultured seafood comes to market. Finless Foods has claimed it will start selling its cell-based bluefin tuna by the end of this year, and Wild Type is developing cultured salmon. On the crustacean front, Singapore-based startup Shiok Meats is about to have the first taste test of its cell-based shrimp.

But it’ll be a while before cultured fish hits the market and even longer before it’ll show up in our supermarket sushi. Until then, Ocean Hugger and Ima are smart to capitalize off of the booming plant-based food trend, especially in a space like sushi which currently has relatively few animal-free options. There are plenty of vegan burgers, sausages, and even canned fish (see above), but there hasn’t been a lot of innovation in making alternatives to raw fish.

Fair, it’s a lot harder to imitate the taste and texture of a slice of fatty raw tuna than a tin of cooked tuna fish. But early movers like Ocean Hugger and Ima have the chance to really get in on the ground floor stake a claim in what will likely be a booming market: plant-based fish.

If you get the chance to try ahimi or Ima’s new “salmon” sushi, give us a shout and let us know how you liked it!