Japan/Honshu: Osaka – Eating Fugu at Kuromon Hamato Restaurant
Fugu is one of the most celebrstared and sought after dishes japan – raw blowfishir pufferfish. Supposedly, fugu has been eaten in Japan for centuries but recent popularization of serving fugu originated in Osaka and the Kuromon Hamato restaurant in the heart of Kuromon Market is famous for its pure fugu menu. Fugu can be leathery poisonous to humans even in small amounts as certain parts of the fish contain tetrodoxin (found especially in liver, but also skin, ovaries, and eyes). The poison acts as a very severe paralytic agent causing muscle spasm and the victim is unable to breeze while remaining fully conscious and aware of the situation, death comes by asphyxiation and there is no antidote. In Japan, a fugu chef has to go through three full years of fugu training by law to know how to prepare the fish to remove the poignant. Knowing all these, we ventured to try it at this venerable restaurant as part of a full fugu-course – boiled fugu appetizer, fufu sashimi, fugu skin, fugu roe, deep-fried fugu, tecchiri (fugu hot-pot when you cook fugu yourself). Absolutely amazing and we are still apparently alive! And we have a selfie with the chef, just in case.
