66 DESCRIPTION OF IMPORTANT FISHERIES AND THEIR PRODUCTS 



corrugated or fiberboard fillet cartons have been introduced which cost 

 significantly less than the fillet cans and have sufficient strength and 

 moisture resistance to be suitable for the purpose intended. The fillets 

 may be layer-packed in the cans or % to 1 pound of fillets are wrapped 

 in cellophane and then packed in the cans. The filled cans are then iced 

 down in wooden boxes or barrels for shipment to market. 



Fillets to be frozen are generally brine-dipped after filleting and before 

 going to the packing line. The brine used ranges in concentration from 

 10 to 45° salinometer and the immersion time varies from 3 to 15 seconds. 

 An escalator conveyor removes the fillets from the brine tank and dumps 

 them either onto a conveyor or into a shallow bin. The conveyor takes 

 the brined fillets to the one-pound packing fine where each woman packer 

 has a scale on which she packs, then weighs, the filled carton and adjusts 

 the weight if necessary by adding or subtracting small pieces of fish cut 

 from larger fillets. Experienced packers rarely need to use the scales, and 

 on some packing lines no scales are used, the cartons being only spot- 

 checked for weight before going to the overwrap machine. 



The cartons used measure l^ie X 3 X S}i inches and are typically of 

 one-piece construction made from waxed paperboard. Waxed, bleached 

 sulfite paper is applied to the cartons by standard overwrapping machines. 

 The wrapped packages are placed in trays and frozen in plate freezers. 

 When frozen, the packages are transferred to corrugated master cartons 

 containing 12 or 24 packages and put in cold storage. 



When 5 and 10-pound packages are to be filled, the fillets are scooped 

 from the shallow bin, weighed out in 5 or 10-pound lots, dumped into 

 the bottom half of a two-piece waxed carton, and conveyed to the packing 

 line. The women packers wrap ^ to 1 pound of fillets in cellophane and 

 place the packs in another bottom half of the two-piece carton. When 

 filled, the cartons are covered and conveyed to the end of the packing 

 line where they are placed in trays for freezing in either sharp or plate 

 freezers, or occasionally they are placed in racks for blast freezing. After 

 freezing, the packages are put in master cartons containing five 10-pound 

 or ten 5-pound packages and transferred to cold storage. 



Quality Considerations. There is considerable variation in quality of 

 the haddock unloaded from the typical Georges Bank trawler. Usually 

 the best quality ''last-caught" fish are used for the fresh fish trade while 

 the "first-caught" are frozen ''before they get any worse." Quality loss 

 may also occur during unloading and processing. Chief reasons for these 

 losses are as follows: 



Pitchfork. The two-tined forks customarily used are responsible not 

 only for physical damage to the flesh, but the holes produced provide 

 easy access for bacteria present in large numbers on the skin of the fish. 



