Shalie Dahl Moore came to St. Louis from Petersburg, Alaska—via Seattle and Lindsborg, Kansas—with plans to be a school teacher. When that career path butted up against her family’s commercial fishing schedule, however, the fourth-generation fisher decided to take the leap into the seafood business, filling the void of high-quality direct-to-market—or as she calls it, sea-to-plate—fish through her brand, Wheelhouse Fish Co. Already making waves with her presence at the U City Farmers Market and her online pickup and delivery platform, Dahl Moore is getting ready to expand Wheelhouse’s reach through additional markets this coming season, as well as a forthcoming market and prepared food stall at Urban Eats, the Dutchtown culinary incubator. Dahl Moore recently shared about how she got here and her vision for Wheelhouse—one that she hopes will push St. Louisans to think about fish in ways they never have before.
Wheelhouse is a relatively new brand, but you trace its roots back much further than the company’s founding. How did it come to be? Wheelhouse Fish Co. just started in 2023, but the journey really started long before then—long before I was even born. Commercial fishing is something my family has been doing for generations in Alaska. I am a fourth-generation commercial fisherman in Alaska, but prior to that, my family in Norway was fishing. The journey really started there.
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I’m sure people in the Midwest think growing up in a small fishing community in Alaska is the wildest thing, but you say it’s all you knew—that the Midwest feels wild. Tell us about that. My hometown is Petersburg, Alaska, and most everyone there is a fisherman; that’s what we all do. Kids all grow up on boats fishing with their families. It’s part of our upbringing, and to me, it’s very normal because that’s what everyone did. But when I moved to the Midwest for college, I learned it’s not normal at all. There are only about 3,000 people on the island, and the only way there is by boat or plane—that’s how it is in all the towns near me, because where we are from in southeast Alaska is an archipelago of islands. I played basketball when I was growing up and never took a bus to a game; we either took a ferry or would fly or take these jet boats, then stay for three days or a week with the players’ families in the town. When I got to college [in Kansas] I remember my teammates would be complaining about having to take a bus three hours to a game, and I was like, “This is great!” I’d never done that before. It’s a bubble and completely different.
How did you choose the Midwest for college? Was it a difficult transition? We don’t have any colleges on our island, so if you’re going to go to college, it’s either online or you leave. I was recruited to play college basketball and spent the first two years in Seattle; then, I was recruited to play at a school in central Kansas. At first, people would ask why I was going to Kansas, and I’d tell them, “That’s a great question. I’m not sure.” I wasn’t sure of what to expect and hadn’t spent much time in the Midwest, but I visited this school and really loved the town. It’s a small town, and the people there reminded me of the people in Alaska; it was rural, and many people were farmers, so it felt familiar. It was an awesome community—more familiar than Seattle, which was my first big-city experience. That’s where I drove with my first stoplight. We don’t have stop lights in Petersburg.
How did you get to St. Louis, and what are your impressions about it? We moved here for my husband’s schooling; he’s going to Logan [University] for chiropractic, and we absolutely love it here. We love the food scene; there are so many things to do, great parks, all of these great little neighborhoods, and so much culture. I love that you can immerse yourself in different people’s stories and their cultures and learn through the food they serve or the art they make. And people here love to support local, which I thought was rare for a big city. The other thing that’s really cool is that we are able to drive to so many places: I could be in Kansas City in three hours or New Orleans in 10. It feels so accessible. St. Louis is really cool in and of itself, but it’s also in an awesome geographic position to explore other areas of the U.S. I still spend a lot of time in Alaska, but when I’m here, I want to see everything.
You went to school for education and taught here in St. Louis for two years. What made you decide to leave that path to open Wheelhouse? I love education, and I love teaching. I taught health and physical education to third, fourth, and fifth graders in South City and was really passionate about it, but the fishing season coincides with the school year, and I really wanted to fish more. I’ve always loved fishing; it’s been one of my favorite things I’ve ever done. I often say commercial fishing is so much more than a job; it’s a lifestyle. We stay on the boat for salmon season, sleeping and eating out there. I call it camping because you are kind of just out there. I fish with my family, so it is so much more than a job; it’s an experience. When I was teaching, I had to get off the boat early. While we were out on the boat, my dad, mom, sister, husband and I would always talk over the course of a few seasons about direct marketing our own fish – you have a lot of time to think and dream and talk when you’re on a boat with five people for three months. Eventually, the opportunity came along for me to fish more, and I had to stop teaching to do that, so here we are—and it’s been awesome.
What is your vision for Wheelhouse? Our vision is really to share the seafood and the story. The way we are doing that has varied already in our first year, and I think it’s going to be different in the future as well. We’re doing farmers’ markets—last year, we were at University City’s, and this year we will be at University City, Tower Grove, and The Boulevard—where we sell our seafood that is flash-frozen on the boats at sea, so you can take it home and prepare it with your family and friends. Then, we added cooked fresh seafood at the markets. In my hometown for the Fourth of July, we did teriyaki salmon bowls that sold really well; if you can sell salmon in a salmon town, then you are onto something, so we figured that we could maybe do this in St. Louis, and it was a hit. We also do online pickup and free local delivery, and we are getting into local restaurants, doing cooking classes with Fennel Cooking Studio, and hope to add nationwide shipping.
And now your place at Urban Eats is coming soon. How will that add to your offerings? Urban Eats is going to be an extension of what we are already doing—a market and an eatery. People will be able to purchase retail items there, or you can have your food cooked for you. Our goal is to appeal to those who want to cook at home for family and friends, but also to those who don’t want to cook for themselves, or maybe people who love going to restaurants to get inspired for cooking at home. I love helping people get creative and maybe try doing something with fish that they never would have thought of. Being from a fishing community, we eat fish all the time, so you have to get creative with how you serve it, so you don’t get bored. Anything you can use a different protein for, you should be able to sub in some kind of fish, like halibut enchiladas. There are so many good things you can do with seafood beyond more commonplace recipes. We call what we are doing sea-to-plate or deck-to-dish. It’s just like farm-to-table—people want to know where their food comes from, and I can tell them because I was actually there.
