Delacata Style Catfish Tasting

To celebrate the retail debut of Delacata Style Catfish to the metro-Jackson market, Simmons Catfish, a Yazoo-based farm and processing plant, will offer free Delacata tastings at McDade's Maywood Mart location on Friday, August 30, from 4 to 6 p.m. Country music station Miss 103 will broadcast live in front of the store, giving away prizes and promoting the event. 

Delacata Style Catfish is an earth-friendly, sustainably sourced whitefish developed and marketed by The Catfish Institute. A premium seafood option comparable to redfish, snapper and grouper, Delacata has a mildly sweet flavor that works well with sauces, marinades and herb rubs. 

It's trial, error for north Miss. catfish farmer

Brent Wedel routinely produces more than 1 million pounds of catfish a year from his 26-pond farm in Egypt in Chickasaw County. His success is noteworthy in an industry that, as a whole, has declined steeply over the past decade.

The Mississippi catfish industry peaked in 2002, with more than 113,000 acres of ponds statewide. Today, that acreage is down to about 45,000, according to Mississippi State University aquaculture expert Jim Steeby.

Read more from Sarah Robinson here.