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DNA Bar Coding Finds Mislabeled Sushi
Posted by
timothy
on Fri Aug 22, 2008 01:35 PM
from the travesty-of-the-seas dept.
from the travesty-of-the-seas dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "The NY Times reports that Kate Stoeckle and Louisa Strauss, who graduated this year from the Trinity School in Manhattan, took on a freelance science project to check 60 samples of seafood using a simplified genetic fingerprinting technique called DNA Bar Coding to see whether the fish New Yorkers buy is what they think they are getting, and found that one-fourth of the fish samples with identifiable DNA were mislabeled: A piece of sushi sold as the luxury treat white tuna turned out to be Mozambique tilapia, a much cheaper fish that is often raised by farming. Roe supposedly from flying fish was actually from smelt." (More below.)
"Seven of nine samples that were called red snapper were mislabeled, and they turned out to be anything from Atlantic cod to Acadian redfish, an endangered species. The project began over dinner with Stoeckle's father, a scientist and early proponent of the use of DNA bar codings. Instead of sequencing the entire genome, bar coders examine a single gene. Dr. Stoeckle said he was excited to see the technology used in a new way and compared the technique to GPS. 'The smaller and cheaper you make something,' he said, 'the more uses it has.'"
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Is That Sushi Hazardous To Your Health? 554 comments
pdclarry writes "A recent study by scientists at the American Museum of Natural History and Columbia University found that a piece of tuna sushi may not be tuna at all: 'A piece of tuna sushi has the potential to be an endangered species, a fraud or a health hazard,' wrote the authors. 'All three of these cases were uncovered in this study.' The study, published in PLoS ONE examined 68 samples of tuna sushi purchased from 31 restaurants in Manhattan (New York City) and Denver, Colorado. Some of these were from endangered species, others were not as labeled, and some were not tuna at all. Of these last, five samples labeled as 'white tuna' were from a toxic fish, Escolar, which is a gempylid species banned for sale in Italy and Japan due to health concerns. 'It can cause gastrointestinal symptoms ranging from mild and rapid passage of oily yellow or orange droplets, to severe diarrhea with nausea and vomiting. The milder symptoms have been referred to as keriorrhea [i.e. flow of wax in Greek].' Fraud in sushi is not new; Slashdot also reported study on mislabeling in 2008. This new study shows that some sushi can actually make you sick. The study was also covered by Wired."
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So..?? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I saw this on Yahoo News this morning, I think it was an AP or UPI story so it could have been the same one, but the article I saw didn't even mention sushi, but different species of fish, and named the species that were misrepresented.
One sample was from an endangered species.
Seems that it should be a government function, say the FOOD and drug administration, to not only make sure that your food won't kill you but that what you pay for is what you get.
Restaraunts here sell walleye [wikipedia.org], but walleye is in danger
Re:So..?? (Score:4, Informative)
Seems that it should be a government function, say the FOOD and drug administration, to not only make sure that your food won't kill you but that what you pay for is what you get.
I wonder if it's the restaurants pulling one, or their suppliers (or both)
Restaraunts here sell walleye [wikipedia.org], but walleye is in dangered and illegal (at least accorsing to a restaurant owner I talked to) so they sell pollack [wikipedia.org] and call it walleye. IMO it should be illegal to put "ribeye steak" on the menu and serve you dog.
Walleye endangered? I've never heard of that...sounds wacky to me, they're all over the great lakes, etc. (correction after looking it up -- the BLUE walleye has been extinct for about 30 years, but there are still lots of regular walleye).
I had walleye on a stick at the Minnesota state fair--it was great! My dad used to catch them when he was a kid too.
Parent
Walleye are not endangered just expensive (Score:3, Insightful)
So theyll sell pikeperch which tastes almost exactly the same but costs a lot less. Its illegal to mislabel to do so but hard to enforce
Re:So..?? (Score:4, Insightful)
Fraud is no part of a free market and does not deserve any protection.
Parent
Re:So..?? (Score:4, Insightful)
So, for example, if someone slips some corn product into a food product and doesn't put it on the label because "buyer beware" then when I, a person with an allergy to corn, eats it and gets sick/dies, guess I'm just SOL? I guess so, in your world. I guess it would also be ok for me to pop your head like a melon from 1000 yards and then take all your stuff, since you're so against government regulation of private behavior.
Parent
Re:So..?? (Score:4, Insightful)
It is illegal to mis-represent items for sale. You want more legislation than that?
How about enforcement? I'm not going to perform random DNA samples on my food. But I still expect to be sold what it says on the label/menu, so someone has to do that verification.
Parent
Re:So..?? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:So..?? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:So..?? (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, perhaps a certification kit could be made that consumers could use every so often to check on their fishmongers and Sushi bars. Hopefully it wouldn't cost that much but costs would be proportional to the type of food tested. I know some rare sushi can get expensive. I would like to know I'm getting my money's worth. You could then pool the resources and rate different establishments on honesty. Obviously there might be a potential for abuse. So even if i just randomly check and can take the box to the kit comes in with me so they know I'll be looking and give me the right stuff, I would know I got my money's worth and probably find a trusted supplier that I would frequent.
Parent
Re:So..?? (Score:4, Insightful)
So says Arterion:
Exactly! Who cares what is it as long as it tastes good. This is snobbery at its finest.
So, you don't mind being charged double or triple the cost of something because it is labeled as something more expensive? As long as it tastes good, that isn't a issue for you?
Parent
I'm wondering about the contents of my burrito... (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Oh don't worry: If it's from Taco Bell, it doesn't have any organic matter in there anyway.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I'm wondering about the contents of my burrito. (Score:5, Funny)
Doesn't cooking destroy DNA?
This article is about sushi. He's eating his burrito raw.
Parent
Re:I'm wondering about the contents of my burrito. (Score:5, Informative)
Outside of Japan, sushi is sometimes misunderstood to mean the raw fish itself, or even any fresh raw-seafood dishes.
In Japan, sliced raw fish alone is called sashimi and is distinct from sushi, as sashimi is the raw fish component, not the rice component.
The word sushi itself comes from an archaic grammatical form of a word that is no longer used in other contexts; literally, sushi means "it's sour".
Parent
sushi, sashimi (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:sushi, sashimi (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Not only that, but can't sushi also contain cooked fish?
Of course. I've had many a sushi roll containing tempura shrimp, tataki-style tuna, and so forth.
Economic Incentive to Mislabel? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Economic Incentive to Mislabel? (Score:5, Insightful)
So, what are the Japanese names of the fish in question?
After all, the North American "Trout" is really closer to a salmon than the European "Trout". A North American "Bass" is really just a big sunfish. People came over here and used the old fish names for critters of similar size and habits.
The "Chilean Sea Bass" was a deliberate renaming of the Patagonian Toothfish to have a more commercially desirable name.
So, all in all there are at least five different distinct families of fish that are called "bass".
Parent
Re:Economic Incentive to Mislabel? (Score:4, Interesting)
Latin names can be wrong too. As the OP alluded to, trout were once considered distinct from salmon and char. The fish were categorized into these groups based on morphological and behavioral differences (trout = Salmo [wikipedia.org], salmon = Oncorhynchus [wikipedia.org], char = Salvelinus [wikipedia.org] ).
Then DNA testing became available and totally destroyed the well-established taxonomy. Rainbow trout, which for centuries had been the archetypical example of a trout, turned out to be more closely related to the salmons. Atlantic salmon were a trout. Lake trout in the Great Lakes were a char. Click on the above Wikipedia links and you can tell how much damage was done to the taxonomy by comparing the common names to the genus. Rainbow trout (aka steelhead) which were formerly Salmo mykiss are now Oncorhynchus mykiss.
Parent
Re:Economic Incentive to Mislabel? (Score:5, Insightful)
you can tell the diffrence by looking at it and touching it. (you can tell through gloves or thin plastic)
if you work with fish enough - you should be able to tell what fish you are working with by just looking at it and maybe touching it.
while i wouldn't know some exotic south specific fish - any that are found off NC i could identify quite easily - then again i used to work at a fish mart. and fished alot growing up.. so i was exposed to it.
i would expect any sushi chef worth a damn to be able to do the same for what he is serving.
and as for the diffrense between kobe beef and normal stuff you get.. again you can tell the diffrence by just touching it - if you know what your are looking for
Parent
Re:Economic Incentive to Mislabel? (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
For certain meanings of fix.
Big Surprise (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Big Surprise (Score:5, Informative)
Here in Tampa, Florida area, this was recently a very big deal. One of the things Tampa is famous for is Grouper, and several well-known restaurants were found to be serving cheaper fish instead of Grouper.
6 out of 11 restaurants served cheaper fish [sptimes.com].
According to that article though it's hard to tell whether the deception was intentional, and even if so, who was deceptive: the restaurant, the wholesaler, etc.
Parent
Re:Big Surprise (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Big Surprise (Score:5, Funny)
We secretly replaced this group's sushi with Folger's crystals. Let's see if they notice...
Parent
Re:Big Surprise (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, yes and no. With any dish, ingredients are going to vary in quality and the cooking/preparing will also vary. So you go into a restaurant, order Red Snapper and after eating it you thought it was just OK. Maybe the chef didn't know what they were doing. Maybe that particular fish just wasn't a good specimen. Maybe it's been frozen a bit long. Maybe it's a bit past the sell by date.
Or maybe it's not Red Snapper.
In my personal experience, I've had really good Red Snapper, and I've not so good Red Snapper. Was the difference because of the former factors, or because of the latter? Not having a raw sample and a DNA test, I couldn't tell you for sure.
Parent
Re:Big Surprise (Score:5, Informative)
.
The same thing happened to orange roughy [mar-eco.no] and monkfish [google.com] (both some of the most hideous looking fish you'll ever see), and shark (difficult to prepare because of the high ammonia content in the meat). All were once considered trash and literally shoveled overboard in the pursuit of (at the time) more valuable fish. Now that those more valuable fish have been overfished, the industry spruces up the image of what was formerly considered trash fish to sell to the public.
BTW, what's sold as red snapper often isn't red snapper. Pretty much any of the snappers [wikipedia.org] and frequently any of the rockfishes (aka rock cod) [wikipedia.org] are sold as red snapper. Most of their meat is pretty similar, but there are subtle differences.
Parent
Re:Big Surprise (Score:4, Interesting)
I used the same article as a component of a short essay on artistic taste [wordpress.com].
Parent
Confucius say (Score:4, Funny)
Confucius say "Man who check fish too closely never get bone in freelay."
Another article (Score:3, Interesting)
Ahhh, a RED SNAPPAH. Mmmmm, very tasty. (Score:5, Funny)
Kuni: Okay, Weaver, listen carefully. You can hold on to your red snapper...
Kuni: ...or you can go for what's in the box that Hiro-San is bringing down the aisle right now! What's it gonna be?
Phyllis Weaver: I'll take the box. The box!
Kuni: You took the box? Let's see what's in the box!
Kuni: Nothing! Absolutely nothing! STUPID! You're so STU-PIIIIIIIIIIID!
Re:Ahhh, a RED SNAPPAH. Mmmmm, very tasty. (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
Obligatory Jokes (Score:5, Funny)
Roe supposedly from flying fish was actually from smelt.
Of course, the roe from flying fish are from smelt; they're the ones that are being dive-bombed!
Seven of nine samples...
Leave it to the Slashdot crowd to put a Star Trek reference in a story about seafood.
Mr. Leonard is going to be very happy (Score:4, Interesting)
In holland a newspaper called AD has a feature where they test fries, patat.
The ones that win proudly display the article and do massive business because of it. With so many bad fast food places being tested as being the best is an excellent piece of advertising.
If you were going to buy fish/sushi and you just read this article, where would you go?
Something's fishy here! (Score:4, Funny)
"If you were going to buy fish/sushi and you just read this article, where would you go?"
Uhmm...fishing?
Parent
Tobiko vs. Masago (Score:4, Informative)
FTA: Roe supposedly from flying fish was actually from smelt.
Cheaper sushi bars do this all the time, and you don't need DNA sequencing to spot the difference. Tobiko (flying fish roe) eggs are larger than smelt eggs, and they're a clear orange color.
-jcr
Re: (Score:5, Informative)
Steve Palumbi did this back in the mid-90's for whale and dolphin products being sold in commercial markets in Korea and Japan (Baker and Palumbi 1994 Science 265: 1538; Baker et al. 1995 Molecular Ecology 5:671). Essentially they went around the fish stalls taking samples and amplifying and sequencing them in their hotel room. From the latter article abstract:
This 'spot check' revealed a surprising variety of species for sale, including minke, fin and humpback whales and one or two species of dolphins sold as 'kujira' or whale. In the Korean survey, DNA amplifications were conducted by two of us (C.S.B. and F.C.) working with independent equipment and reagents. The two sets of DNA amplifications were returned to our respective laboratories and sequenced independently for cross-validation. Among the total of 17 species-specific sequences we found a dolphin, a beaked whale, 13 Northern Hemisphere minke whales (representing at least seven distinct individuals) and two whales which are closely related to the recognized sei and Bryde's whales but could not be identified as either using available type sequences. We suggest that these two specimens represent a currently unrecognized species or subspecies of Bryde's whale, possibly the so-called 'small-form' reported from the tropical waters of the Indo-Pacific.
Until these guys went out and actually did the sequencing, no one knew for sure how much illegal whaling activity was going on.
half a pun (Score:3, Funny)
I want to do some sort of pun on Roe v. something but I can't think of anything fishy that rhymes with Wade.
Eh, the best one was from Katrina.
"What does Bush think about Roe vs. Wade?"
"He doesn't care how they get out of New Orleans."
This method has some limitations (Score:3, Informative)
Since this relies on segments of mitochondrial DNA(not the nucleus's DNA), it fails in species with endosymbiotic bacteria, such as many arthropods and the Wolbachia bacteria. So it's unlikely this will work on, say, crab or lobster.
Wolbachia [wikipedia.org] is an awesome bacteria, as it can cause those infected with it to be unable to breed with those not infected, which could possibly induce the divergence of species. Some species have been infected with it so long, generationally, that they go sterile if you give them antibiotics.
Great... (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Getting it hot and covering it with a salty...oh, hell, I'm not even going to finish that one.
Common Practice in the Food Industry (Score:4, Informative)
This is a common practice in the food industry. While there might be a few cases of people really not realize what they've bought for their consumers is the wrong stuff, by far and large, especially in the restaurant biz, they know it's not what they've claimed it to be.
Why do this do this? Profits of course! Charge $18 for a mahi meal and serve them cod or tilapia instead. The average persons taste buds aren't refined enough to know the difference.
I've been kindly asked to leave sushi places before when my "fresh super white tuna from Korea" tasted a lot like farm raised cod, which I rudely pointed out when the waitress asked me if "everything was ok". At least I got a somewhat free meal out of it!
And now that I think about it, all of the Sushi places I've been too, there's only been one or two places that actually served what they advertised. Hands down, best tasting sushi I will ever have.
Ultimately, I don't think this will change anything on the restaurant side. Grocery store side? Maybe. When you can make large profits from misrepresenting what you're selling and get away with it, the barcoding won't stop it. All it will do is help the honest business stay honest.
A subject I am actually an expert on (Score:5, Informative)
I work as a fish wholesaler. We deal mostly with restaurants but we do a few retail establishments too.
The fish business is surprisingly crooked. With the Russian mafia controlling the caviar trade and various fly by night operations selling foul product that has been color treated to look new.Having a competent chef is vary important when dealing with fish quality. Labeling is a constant problem in the fishing industry even with the COOL act. Domestic red snapper is the worst of the lot when it comes to company's labeling poorly. Mainly because on a wholesale level the fish sells for 13.95-14.95 per pound fillet (regional price only), while tilapia is often sold at 6.95-7.95 per pound fillet. Other things that get sold as red snapper is red rock, corvina, lane snapper, ling snapper. (although ling is often not cheaper) It is so bad that the USDC stepped in and only 1 genus of fish can be sold as red snapper, 2 in California. The trick to buying red snapper is to only buy it skin on, preferably whole. If it is skin off fillet pass because it's almost impossible to identify then. Selling tilapia as tuna is retarded those two fish do not even taste similar although if the fish is drenched in soy sauce and wasabi it is difficult to tell even the widest of gaps in fish taste.
Also since this is going to come up at one point. Scallops that are marked sea scallops or processed scallops ARE NOT skate or shark. These scallops are treated with tripolyphosphate so they soak up water. Dry pack scallops are not treated so they are a better quality scallop. It is very difficult to cut skate in such a way on an industrial level to make it look like a scallop especially when the yield from it would cut into profit and most chefs can tell the difference.
And while I'm at it:
Amberjack is not mahi
Ahi meens tuna or yellowfin tuna. Saying ahi tuna is silly
Ono and wahoo are the same god damn fish just buy the cheaper wahoo
Langostino is from a squat lobster which isn't really a lobster but it still tastes good.
Re:seems to be common (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course some people who have never known good sushi (east coasters) would have no idea what to expect. Maybe the people who frequent these places simply have no idea what the correct fish is supposed to taste like.
It's charming the way that West Coasters, especially Californians, imagine they have better food than other regions. Dead wrong, but charming.
Parent
Re:seems to be common (Score:4, Informative)
I agree. I've traveled all over the US (and abroad), and on average, Houston has more restaurants with better quality food (and a wider variety of cuisines) than just about anywhere in the US. If you love eating out, Houston is the place to live really.
That being said, while there are a number of *great* sushi places in Houston with some really creative chefs making great preparations, the quality of the actual fish meat itself is noticeably superior in the SF Bay Area.
Parent