The Charleston City Paper’s Dish Dining Guide promotes local shrimp from Captain Wayne Magwood that appear on the menu of Two Boroughs Larder, a local-centric restaurant and market in downtown’s Elliotborough neighborhood. In “The Magwoods keep the heads on and the freshness intact: Wild Shrimp,” Robert Moss writes:
At the peak in the 1980s, almost a hundred trawlers operated out of Shem Creek, supplying shellfish to wholesalers and grocery stores from New York to Florida. Then, in a vicious squeeze-play, foreign shrimp started driving down prices, while at the same time rising fuel bills and waterfront property values drove up costs. The imported stuff — much of it pond-raised, flash-frozen, and shipped thousands of miles — now accounts for more than 90 percent of the American market. The number of trawlers working out of Shem Creek is now down to around 10. …
The economics are daunting, but local shrimpers have one trump card remaining in their hand: the quality of their product. All the shrimp sold at Magwood’s comes from trawlers working local waters. It’s always fresh — caught and sold the same day — with no chemicals or preservatives.