Introducing Gilded Fish
September 18, 2026 – Gil Levy
Gilded Fish started with the idea that deliciousness is a form of nourishment. Flavor and nutrition are closely intertwined, and the ingredients that deliver both shouldn’t be reserved for a tasting menu. They should be easy to find on a shelf.
That idea took shape over years, first in professional kitchens including Chez Panisse, and later curating the pantry at Bernal Cutlery, where sourcing good olive oil, vinegar, miso, salt, and other staples for customers became its own education in what “good” actually means and where it comes from.
The Largest Wild Salmon Run
The idea for starting a US-based fish company came together on a trip to Portugal, where tinned fish is revered and an everyday staple. Salmon from Bristol Bay, Alaska deserves this kind of attention. It’s the largest sockeye salmon fishery on earth, holding nearly half of the world’s wild sockeye. No hatcheries, no supplementation, just a watershed that’s sustained both wild salmon and the people who depend on them for thousands of years. It’s one of the last places where a run of this size shows up every summer, the way it always has, helped in no small part by Alaska literally writing sustainable fishing practices into its constitution—the only state in the US to do so. Every run in Bristol Bay is managed for long-term abundance first, not short-term catch, which is a big part of why the fishery is healthy after a century of commercial fishing.
The Bristol Bay connection came through Gil’s brother Eyal, a documentary filmmaker. One of his films, Unearth, follows fishermen and Native Alaskans fighting to stop the proposed Pebble Mine, a project that would have put the largest wild salmon run in the world at risk. Eyal produced the film alongside two of the fishermen at the center of the fight, brothers Aube and Dune. The salmon in Gilded Fish now comes directly from them.
Good People at Every Step of the Short Supply Chain
The salmon is smoked and hand-packed into tins at a family-run cannery on the Oregon coast that’s been operating since 1953. When the first batch came through, the head of the cannery—who has been canning fish since he was seven years old with the same equipment—took a bite straight out of the smoker and turned to Gil, “damn, this fish is good.”
To complement the sockeye centerpiece, Gil wanted to source the best ingredients to bring out the natural flavors of the salmon. Every tin is made with Bay Area favorite Séka Hills olive oil, produced by the Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation on their ancestral land in California’s Capay Valley. The tribe farms the olives and mills the oil on land they fought for decades to reclaim. It’s a fitting pairing for this food built around direct relationships and respect for where things actually come from.
Yuzukararin, a citrus and chili condiment made in Mihara Village, Kochi, Japan, rounds out the ingredients in the Yuzu & Chili tin. It's sourced through Bernal Cutlery’s own relationship with the woman who makes it in small batches by hand. Read more about Yuzukararin here.
Gilded Fish is built on a handful of direct relationships, in Bristol Bay and beyond. Premium ingredients, a short supply chain, and genuine love of food—that’s the whole company. These first two tins are just the beginning for Gilded Fish, with more in the works.
See more of Gil’s pantry selections here.
