![]() Prepared fugu is also often available in grocery stores, which must display official license documents. Live fish arrive at a restaurant, surviving in a large tank, usually prominently displayed. The largest wholesale fugu market in Japan is in Shimonoseki.įugu prices rise in autumn and peak in winter, the best season, because they fatten to survive the cold. Most fugu is now harvested in the spring during the spawning season and then farmed in floating cages in the Pacific Ocean. Strict fishing regulations are now in place to protect fugu populations from depletion. Official fugu preparation license of Tokyo issued by the Governor of Tokyo The list names safe genera including pufferfish of the Lagocephalus and Sphoeroides genera and the related porcupinefish ( Harisenbon) of the family Diodontidae. The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan provides a list that shows which species' body parts can be consumed. Other species are also eaten for example, Higanfugu ( T. The torafugu, or tiger pufferfish ( Takifugu rubripes), is the most prestigious edible species and the most poisonous. The scholar-statesman Su Shi famously remarked that the taste is worthy of death (值那一死). In China, the use of the pufferfish for culinary purposes was already well established by the Song dynasty as one of the 'three delicacies of the Yangtze' (長江三鮮), alongside saury and Reeve's shad, and appears in the writings of the polymath Shen Kuo as well as in the encyclopedic work Taiping Guangji. According to one fugu chef in Tokyo, the Emperor of Japan has never eaten fugu due to an unspecified "centuries old ban". During the Meiji Era (1867–1912), fugu was again banned in many areas. ![]() ![]() In western regions of Japan, where the government's influence was weaker and fugu was easier to get, various cooking methods were developed to safely eat them. It became common again as the power of the Shōgunate weakened. The Tokugawa shogunate (1603–1868) prohibited the consumption of fugu in Edo and its area of influence. Fugu bones have been found in several shell middens, called kaizuka, from the Jōmon period that date back more than 2,300 years. The inhabitants of Japan have eaten fugu for centuries. Fugu has become one of the most celebrated dishes in Japanese cuisine.įugu sale in a market street in Osaka, Japan ![]() The liver was served as a traditional dish named fugu-kimo, being widely thought to be a tasty part, but it is also the most poisonous, and serving this organ in restaurants was banned in Japan in 1984. Domestic preparation occasionally leads to accidental death.įugu is served as sashimi and nabemono. ![]() The restaurant preparation of fugu is strictly controlled by law in Japan and several other countries, and only chefs who have qualified after three or more years of rigorous training are allowed to prepare the fish. The fugu ( 河豚 鰒 フグ) in Japanese, bogeo ( 복어 鰒魚) or bok ( 복) in Korean, and hétún (河豚 河魨) in Standard Modern Chinese is a pufferfish, normally of the genus Takifugu, Lagocephalus, or Sphoeroides, or a porcupinefish of the genus Diodon, or a dish prepared from these fish.įugu can be lethally poisonous to humans due to its tetrodotoxin, meaning it must be carefully prepared to remove toxic parts and to avoid contaminating the meat. ![]()
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