aften

What do you think of this method of fugu preparation?
I think it's rather cruel, but I'm not a Japanese cuisine expert and
I've never eat it before so I don't know if it's normal to cut a fugu alive like this.

[warning: video might be disturbing for some people]
youtube.com/watch?v=ywLXPYInF_s

shakran

I'm no expert either, but I do not see the purpose for cutting it up while it's still alive. Seems to me you could just whack it against the counter to kill it first, but that could also result in the release of toxins from the organs / eyes into the edible portion of the fish.

If you ask me, such blatant cruelty to an animal is a good enough reason not to eat it, even if the fact that fugu doesn't really taste spectacular does not make you think twice about spending $100 to $300 for a meal.

But non-western cultures have a very different, right or wrong, outlook on what is and is not cruel to animals. Japan also has a dish in which they take a live fish, cut strips of flesh from it, spear the fish on two vertical wooden rods affixed to the plate, lay the meat out in front of the fish, and then the diner eats the meat while being watched by the fish. I guarantee the meat doesn't taste any different for that treatment. From my perspective it is a sad attempt at sadism, since the fish probably can't figure out that that's bits of itself that you're eating, and all it knows is that it's in a lot of fucking pain.

Ratman

If you are living in a "Western" country, and you eat any kind of meat, seafood, or poultry, you should seriously consider your definition of animal cruelty before you go poppin' off about how blatantly cruel or sadistic this is. I live in Japan, and have been lucky enough to have had fugu on about 10 occasions. I can assure you of a couple of things: 1. This is not the standard way of preparing fugu. 2. There are no toxins in the eyes. The only toxic organ is the liver. 3. Wild fugu are bottom feeding fish, and there is something in that diet that creates the toxins. Farm-raised fugu never get to the bottom, therefore they have no toxins. Whacking one against the counter would not risk releasing any toxins in this case, as there aren't any. That being said, I think any fisherman could tell you there are quicker and better ways to kill a fish.

In my experience there are several different parts of the fugu that are prepared in different ways. The first course is usually the skin. It is a bit rubbery, but high in collagen, so the women here love it. This is usually followed by the belly meat served as sashimi. The meat is sliced so thin, it is almost transparent, and arranged in overlapping layers on a plate with a beautiful design. The sashimi is so thin, you can see the design through it. The taste is sublime. If the fish is a male, the next course is the sperm sacs, or "shirako", which are usually grilled. Next comes deep fried fugu, meat from the back. It's not battered like tempura, but breaded in a flour much like cornmeal. This is some of the most delicious fried fish I have ever had. Finally all the left over bits, basically meat left on the bones, are made into a "nabe" or soup. It is a feast that lasts about 3-4 hours, and a wide variety of textures and flavors.

One of the nice things about living in developed countries is that we have the luxury of choosing a diet that suits our nutritional needs and our personal moral standards.

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shakran

I have. I'm not so foolish as to say that a cow enjoys being killed and eaten, but at least it is killed before it is eaten. It is not the usual practice to start butchering the cow until it has been killed, and it is certainly not possible anywhere in the west to go to a restaurant and have an impaled cow kept alive and watching while you eat its flesh. A certain degree of unpleasantness is necessary if we are to eat animals, which we are biologically designed to do. I do understand that. But we should make an effort to limit that unpleasantness by killing the animal before it is butchered or eaten. We certainly should not revel in the animal's painful death throes as we make it watch us eat it.

Also please note that I was careful to specify that such is a Western perspective. It was hoped, though apparently not realized, that readers would recognize that judging another culture on the basis of one's own should be undertaken with the awareness that what is strange, weird, or abhorrent to me is normal to whatever society I am looking at, and therefore value judgments should be taken with a grain of salt.



Good.

Hmm. According to the New York Times, the tora fugu's organs, with the exception of the testes, are poisonous, particularly as you indicate, the liver, and also the ovaries. But I bow to your expertise.

Didn't think it would, but was giving the chef in the video the benefit of the doubt.

Ratman

It was hoped, though apparently not realized, that my reply was to anyone "living in a Western country", and not to any one person in particular. While the death of the animal would be preferred before butchering, and as you say, it is not the usual practice to start butchering before such, it does happen that not all animals (I'm not limiting this to cows, though there is documentary evidence with bovines) are indeed dead before butchering begins. More importantly, the period of time immediately preceding slaughter can be sheer terror for the animal, if viewed in "human" terms. Are cows, pigs, and chickens aware of their impending doom any more than a fish? I don't know. I do know that an oyster is alive when shucked and swallowed. Does that stop people?

There also the assumption that the fish is alive and aware of it's situation as it's being eaten, that it's an intentional act on the part of the preparer and the eater to satisfy some sadistic urge, and that it is reveled in as though that was the point of the whole thing. If that were true, why aren't the Japanese simply spearing dogs on the side of the road and stripping their flesh as they watch, or as you suggest a cow impaled in a manner to purposely immobilize it, yet keep it alive as bits of it's flesh are cut off and barbecued before it's eyes? Why is the Western practice of throwing a live lobster in a pot of boiling water and listening to it scream any different?

It's not that I find the rejection of a culture's food, or the method of preparing or eating of that food, objectionable. Monkey brains or live grubs are not everyone's cup of tea. However, I do object to the condemnation of a culture due to a couple of minutes of video on youtube that is deemed offensive to one's taste, culture or morals.
-----Added 11/12/2008 at 11 : 15 : 40-----
BTW, I am not an expert in fugu preparation, and certainly did not intend to portray myself as such. I have been present when fugu (wild and farmed) have been prepared at the main fish market in Nagahama, Fukuoka. The sellers of fugu there are all licensed. None of the organs of the fugu are consumed, with the exception of the testes, which are cooked first, and the eyes, which are usually eaten raw. The biggest risk of poisoning is if the liver is breached and the knife used to cut the fish is contaminated, or so I've been told. But, hey, the NYT is one of my favorite papers, and if they say it's all poison who am I to argue.

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shakran

Bullshit. That sentence specifically referenced two phrases used in my post, and referred to them as "poppin' off." Additionally, since I was the only one who replied in this thread until you came along, and as your post directly addressed the themes that my post referred to, it is quite clear that you were talking to me. Now you come back with sarcasm, again hijacking a phrase that I wrote. If you're going to be sarcastic, at least be honest.

Quite true. Such is not entered into with the intention of torturing the animal for the sake of torturing the animal. Are you seriously going to sit there and compare accidents of misfortune in the slaughterhouse to purposefully keeping a mutilated fish alive so that it can watch you eat it?

Yes, it can, and actually many slaughterhouses are doing something about that, by designing their layouts such that the animals do not see the other animals getting killed. Some are even custom-building the slaughterhouses with curved surfaces and gentle slopes rather than steps so that the animal does not get nervous as it walks to the kill floor.

It stops me.


Because they do it to fish, instead.

It isn't screaming, that's air escaping past the shell. And I suspect you know that. Additionally, many chefs now kill the lobster just before putting it in the pot.



I think I have made it abundantly clear that I am not condemning Japanese or any other eastern culture. Or was this another statement that wasn't really directed at me, despite the fact that you and I are still the only ones posting in this thread?

Ratman

Bullshit? Are you the only member of the TFP that lives in a Western country? Is it possible that other such members could have jumped on your bandwagon of disgust? My initial post was an attempt to prompt others to consider the culture of food in their own country before "poppin' off" about this video and assuming, as you did, that this is a common practice in Japan, and that it is torturous and sadistic in nature. It was not directed at you, Shakran, as you had already posted your opinion on the topic.

Sadism implies that there is some pleasure (often sexual) derived from the suffering of others, and in the inflicting of that suffering. You continue to imply that this is your belief in your most recent post when you state that Japanese don't torture dogs or cows as they derive enough sadistic, tortuous pleasure from "doing it to fish instead". I think this pretty clearly qualifies as a condemnation of a culture as a whole since you do not differentiate between the people and the practice. Your implication is that if fish weren't available for this, some other animal would be used instead. As I live in Japan, I am lumped into your blanket condemnation of all that have partaken in this particular method of food preparation. I find this directly offensive, since neither I, nor anyone I know here, are sadists who revel in the torture of animals. I have yet to be in a situation where I'm in a group that sits around eating anything with the thought of "Man, look at that suffering! I'm totally digging on this fish watching me eat it! What a rush!"

In addition, your reply that "it was hoped, but not realized" was quoted to let you know that I am not an idiot incapable of perceiving, nor using, sarcasm. Also, I'm happy to know that you live up to your standards by not eating raw oysters, but my point was not directed to you specifically, since you were not directly named in my comment which, I believe to be true since I managed a restaurant that served thousands of raw oysters a week to customers that to a man never asked if the oyster was alive. Nor did they ever question us directly, to my knowledge, as to the state of animation of the lobsters when they were cooked. My point was that there are practices in Western food production that could be morally questionable, yet still remain, that should give us pause before we question those of other cultures.

I'm sure it was not your intention to come off the way you did, but you did come off that way. I have nothing against you, and having been a member here since TFP 2, I know it is not your nature to offend. You are a super mod for a reason. I hope we can both walk away from this with the awareness that what we say can be construed differently than we intended. If you feel the need to address this further, let's take it to PM's.

Peace

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"God made man, but he used the monkey to do it." DEVO

Bear Cub

The day the fish start complaining is the day I'll give it a second thought.

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Starkizzer

Wow, this thread got a little sidetracked and very quickly too.

As to the question the OP was asking, he was merely asking if this was typical for this type of fish or if it was an inhumane practice.

I also have no idea, but I can't stand the thought of anything being killed, I won't even watch the video. (I cried hysterically for 2 hours one night when I saw a cat get hit) I do eat meat but I don't think about the fact that it came from an animal. At the point it is on my plate, it is just a piece of meat. Now, I will NOT eat veal, I have heard of the way they treat them and I don't agree with it, but surprisingly I am ok with lamb. I know I'm weird, I'm ok with this, don't judge, lol.

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lostgirl

The rest of the fish does indeed contain poison, but only trace amounts that aren't enough to kill you.

The reason it is such a delicacy is because of the buzz you get from the small amount of poison you ingest.

dimbulb

Its not a method of preparing fugu, but a trend, of preparing sashimi from live fish/animals.
I've seen a video where the very expert chef slices off the meat of a fish so skillfully that only the skeleton and vital organs are left. It kept swimming for a while after he threw it back into a tank


Ikizukuri - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Shrimp:

guyy

It's not really a delicacy in the Kansai region of Japan. You can buy it frozen in the supermarket. It's supposed to be good for colds & the flu.

shakran

dimbulb's ikizukuri explanation, I think, goes to the point that I tried, apparently without success, to make. The OP's video showed cruelty. That does not mean all japanese people are cruel to animals, but that some are.

To diffuse rebuttal, yes, some Americans are cruel to animals too. Doesn't mean I like that, either, and it doesn't mean I condemn an entire culture for the cruelty of a few.

Frosstbyte

Those videos are fucking intense. While, certainly, it displays an unbelievable amount of skill to be able to do that to a fish and have it keep swimming, it does strike me as unnecessarily cruel. I loves me some meat, but I don't really see any point to torture the animal you're eating when you could just as easily kill it quickly and then eat it, to the same effect.

While there does seem to be some sort of "performance art" to the latter two videos, I haven't the slightest idea why the dude is preparing fugu the way he does in the first video, since that is definitely not meant to be watched by someone about to eat the fish.

Daval

wow. those are crazy videos!

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Baraka_Guru

There is no "humane" way to take the life of an animal for food or for other reasons. There are, however, degrees of "humaneness." Some people don't eat veal, but are okay with chicken for this reason. This is not to say, however, that the chicken is treated "humanely"; it still gets its head chopped off in the long-awaited end.

This preparation of fugu is no exception. If it is unnecessary to do this to the live creature, then doing so is at the cost of added cruelty—simply put.

I say if you're going to eat meat, at least choose the kinds where undue cruelty and suffering isn't on the menu. I suppose this is where factory farming can be a problem as well. This fugu preparation isn't a unique situation.

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Frosstbyte

I don't know that your first paragraph means much, baraka. Animals eat and use other animals, and some animals do so in absolutely grotesque, horrible and painful ways. If you're going to eat meat, something is going to die. That doesn't make it inhumane to kill it. That just means...that's how you get meat to eat. We are equipped with a lot of tools that allow us to kill things quickly and painlessly and still eat them. We are also equipped with tools to allow the animals we do eat to not live in painful or unhealthy environments. I think, since I think humans are supposed to eat meat, that if you do those two things, it's perfectly humane.

If you're a staunch vegetarian, we're really not going to bridge that gap, though, so it's not really relevant to this conversation.

Baraka_Guru

We know that animals suffer the pain of death. We also know that we don't necessarily need to eat them--at least not as much as many of us do.

My point, however, was that since there is no perfectly humane way to end the life of a creature for food, the least we should do is minimize the suffering we cause. And just because we can kill quickly and (possibly) painlessly, it doesn't mean the animal is okay with it. This is why I'm particularly against certain methods of making animals into food. This is why I'm against this particular method of preparing fugu, especially if it's unnecessary.

And, for the record, this thread is about animals as food within the context of cruelty. Vegetarianism has a wealth of knowledge and concern in this regard, and so it is completely relevant.

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Frosstbyte

As far as I can tell, you're approaching this from a vegetarian standpoint and your fundamental belief is that it is morally wrong to kill an animal for the purposes of eating it, which is why you say there's no "humane" way to end the life of a creature for food. I think there are many perfectly humane ways to raise and butcher animals for food. The simple fact that an animal has to die in order for it to be eaten does not, to me, make it automatically inhumane to do so, no matter how the process is carried out. But, there are ways, such as those depicted above (and I'm sure numerous other examples we could find everywhere in the world) which are humane because they deliberately eschew quickly ending the animal's life in favor of prolonging its suffering for convenience or artist value, which is what I think makes them inhumane.

I think the vegetarian viewpoint polarizes the issue-making any and all killing fundamentally inhumane-as opposed to trying to figure out when, if ever, you can kill an animal for food in a way that causes "extra" harm to the animal before it dies.

Xerxys

*bump*