Poisonous fish eyes rave reviews
TOKYO:In the kitchen at Fukudokoro Sakai, a restaurant across the road from a seafood market at the southern tip of the main island of Japan, the chef casually hacks off the head of a live pufferfish.
He skins and guts it while its heart still beats, removing the poisonous parts and tossing them into a bucket on the floor for disposal.
The meat of the fish, stained with blood, will be cleaned and cut into thin, semi-translucent sashimi slices and arranged into a chrysanthemum shape for customers to eat for lunch.
But the poisonous parts— which include the eyes and the liver—are what puts the otherwise nondescript fish in the spotlight. Those bits contain tetrodotoxin, which can kill an adult in hours and for which there is no known antidote.
The pufferfish gets occasional bad press for its toxicity, but it’s the bland taste and big price tag that have been instrumental in hurting the fish’s popularity in Japan, with 3.4 billion yen worth sold in 2017 compared with 5 billion yen in 2007.
But fugu-focussed restaurants hope the Olympics, and the hordes of tourists they will bring, will revive business.
Hajime Sakai, president of the wholesaler Sakai Shoten, which owns Fukudokoro Sakai, has tried to cultivate demand for the fish with online shipments and cute pufferfish ornaments.
This year he has his eyes on the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.
“I really hope (tourists) would come to Shimonoseki, try the pufferfish, and go back wondering why they can’t try this fish back in their respective countries as well,” Sakai said.