Texas Restaurants Brace for Higher Seafood Prices

July 9, 2010— -- It's just before noon at Perla's Seafood and Oyster Bar in Austin, Texas, and the lunch clientele are just beginning to file in.

The bartender is cleaning a few glasses while busboys scurry about, setting tables and cleaning up. One of Perla's owners, Larry McGuire, is sitting at the bar, glancing over the menu and taking a moment to relax before the lunch rush.

Perla's opened in early 2009 and quickly rose to one of the most critically acclaimed restaurants in Austin. McGuire and co-owner Thomas Moorman have fresh fish and shellfish driven in from the Texas coast daily, as well as from the Pacific and Atlantic coasts.

But for Perla's, and seafood restaurants across the state, anxiety levels are rising. Ever since the Transocean offshore rig explosion, which killed 11 people and dumped millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, federal officials have been forced to shut down large portions of the fisheries in the Gulf, leaving fishermen and restaurants in the coastal states to wonder about the future of their livelihood.

At Perla's, the dinner menu includes multiple selections directly from the Gulf, including various oyster and shrimp dishes, Gulf prawns, red snapper and Texas crab. Perla's will resist making changes to its menu or its prices for as long as possible, McGuire said.

"The truth is we do bring in a good portion of our menu from the Gulf, so I just don't know how long we can avoid price increases and continue to have access to the same volume of product [from the Gulf]," he said.

McGuire said he believes his restaurant may see shrimp and shellfish prices increase by as much as 50 percent in the summer months.

He wouldn't be alone. The prices at Massa's Seafood Grill in Houston have already jumped by 20 or 25 percent, owners say.

The National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration has, as of July 4, closed 81,181 square miles of the Gulf's fishing grounds, which is 34 percent of the area's federal waters. The closure area extends from the Atchafalaya Bay (about 80 miles west of New Orleans) east along the coast to Panama City, Fla., and as far south as the tip of southern Florida.Along with price increases, restaurants and seafood wholesalers from Austin to South Florida have seen less and less fish and shellfish coming in for purchase.