Beyond the Surface : Bringing attention to the origin of food with the fish finger as canvas

Abstract: The many technological processes that products go through can make consumers less related to the systems behind them and their origins. The same thing happens to food. This project highlights the implications of a food system within the global scale of today’s mainstream economy and explores the possibilities for a product that originates from a more sustainable food system. Apart from re-designing a processed everyday food product, the aim of this study is to increase awareness of the pressure that the world’s fish stocks are suffering due to overfishing – an issue that is being aggravated by our current food system. For this reason fish fingers (aka fish sticks), which is a well known food product in Sweden, have been chosen as the primary focus in order to make a complex issue more tangible. By re-evaluating what a fish is, analysing current food systems and food products, making sensory explorations and collaborating with chefs, Havsbitar 1.0 and 2.0 (”Sea Bites” 1.0 and 2.0) have been developed. It is a series of fish fingers that has been designed for a desirable future scenario, where a resilient food system has been implemented. The aesthetics of Havsbitar intends to connect it to its ingredients and to the ecosystem it comes from, while maintaining the key characteristics of the fish finger as we know it today. The acceptance of the concept as a food product is an important variable to this project. The concept is placed in the field of Transition Design. Nevertheless, the design of Havsbitar 1.0 is a proposal that is intended to create possibilities for dialogue about an ideal industrialized commercial product. On the other hand, Havsbitar 2.0 follows a more discursive, critical angle towards the fact that fish fingers do not resemble fish, its main ingredient. Havsbitar 2.0 could then be placed in the field of Critical Food Design and Discursive Design.