Medellitin

First of all, great article in the Boston Globe on the pervasive mislabeling of fish.  My one criticism with the piece is the following sentence: The Globe found escolar being sold as white tuna, super-white tuna, or albacore at merchants such as FuGaKyu in Brookline, Kowloon in Saugus, H Mart supermarket in Burlington, and Oishii Sushi Bar in Chestnut Hill. While it is true that the FDA's Seafood List says that you can't sell escolar as white tuna, it is unfair to single out out places for selling escolar as white tuna or super white tuna when it is a pervasive industry practice.  Now, selling it as albacore tuna is more dodgy, because as I have written about before, there is a genuine sushi bar distinction between albacore and escolar . Anyhoo, good article.

I am not the first person on the Internet to tell you that White Tuna is a confusing order at the sushi bar.  While there are a host of fish that can be mislabeled as White Tuna, the two most common ones are the Albacore Tuna and our dreaded and delicious friend, the Escolar . What Is White Tuna? I worked really hard to source both fish in a raw form so that I could bring you pictures.  And by 'worked really hard', I really mean: I would keep going to the same fishmonger and ask them if they had Escolar and Albacore.  Escolar isn't very difficult to find but Albacore can be problematic.  Finally, I found some at the Lobster Place  in Chelsea Market. So, let's take a quick look:

Escolar is the most controversial fish that you are likely to find in your fish market. This firm, white fleshed fish has an incredibly rich flavor, often described as 'succulent', or a fattier version of swordfish. Why so rich? It turns out that Escolar's diet contains food high in wax esters. Wax esters that are really difficult for Escolar to digest. As a result, these esters build up in the fish. Where is the controversy in a buttery, delicious fish? I would say it is in the laxative like effect it has on a certain percentage of the population. Well, a 'laxative like effect' is how my fish monger described it. Others would describe it as closer to diahhrea. An expert would call it 'keriorrhoea'. Literally translated, it means 'flow of wax'. Oily orange droplets pouring out your pooper.  Keriorrhoea occurs because the wax esters in the flesh of the fish pool up in your intestine. Some reports of Escolar related illness include cramp...