The ocean is the home of a thousands of fascinating sea creatures from whales to fish or seahorses, those animals are crucial to the survival of the unique eco-system of the sea life.  Among them, lives a funny look creature that has the appearance of a water balloon. This hilarious looking being, also known as the blowfish or puffer fish is treated with great reverence in the Western cuisine for its potential deadly nature. The fugu dish made with this unique ingredient is famous around the world as a culinary Russian roulette experience; indeed if it isn’t prepared carefully the poison of the fish can be deadly to a human being.

Due to a potent neurotoxin found in the puffer fish, one bite of a fugu dish can become a deadly sin. No antidote has yet been discovered for this fishy poison, so if you want to experiment a risky night out at the restaurant be sure to choose the best chef in town. “The poisonous nature of the dish comes from marine microorganisms that produce the neurotoxin, which travels up to the food chain, eventually finding its way into the puffer fish” (Source: http://www.sushifaq.com/sushi-items/sushi-items-fugu.php).  While the fish itself is immune to the poison located in his organs, this substance is deadly to potential predators. Because of an increase in demand and popularity, the market has encountered an increase in farm-raised puffer fish that are safe for delicate cuisine lovers, since they are free of tetrodoxin. Experts have taken out the poison from the fish’s liver, known as the most lethal but also more delicious part of this funny looking creature. This apparent good news on the side of consumers, is portrayed as a terrible news for the stakeholder of the glowfish market. The Shimonoseki Fugu association is fighting hard to defend this fish considering how profitable is this market. In the world’s most trendy restaurants, a fugu meal can easily cost about $500. Masa Takayama is the owner of the exclusive and extremely secretive restaurant Ginza Sushiko located in Rodeo drive where celebrities from Beverly Hills and all over the world travel to eat this precious and dangerously exciting dish. After Hong Kong, New York is one of the most important importers of the fugu fish while close to ten thousands tons of fugu are consumed annually in Japan.

In western Japan, fugu is called “fuku”, which means “to blow” or “happiness” while the Chinese also call this fish ‘river pig’’ (Source: http://japanesefood.about.com/cs/seafoodfish/a/fugublowfish.htm ). In order to protect consumers, only licensed cooks have the permit to prepare fugu. There are various types of fugu fish and all of them have a different degree of poison and danger. The tora-fugu is the most expensive one and also said to be the most deadly one.

Despite its dangerous nature, the fugu fish serves a noble scope when it comes to scientific research and discoveries. This fish is crucial to the understanding of the human genome is both protagonists have similar complements of genes but “fugu DNA is much more concise, composed of about 365 million nucleotide pairs, or one eighth of the 3 billion pairs in the human genome” (Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/30/science/observatory.html?ref=fugu_fish). Thanks to this water creature, scientists hope to study important DNA sequences in the blowfish in order to apply their discoveries to the human genes.

The puffer fish is one of the world’s most famous and most expensive delicacy, yet, unless you are convinced you meal is prepared by an expert and licensed chef you should abstain because this meal could be your last meal. This fascinating and funny looking creature has almost become a mythological figure all over the world, while it has been eaten in Japan and China for the past century. If you are not ready to risk your life but love fish, you can try to have a fugu dish made from a poison free farm raised fugu or if you really don’t want to risk you can always have ordinary sushi that is quite delightful.