From The Maui News, July 20, 2004 [See "
Crap Shoot," as well as my fervent
escolar page, for the backstory. Also, I reproduce Mr. Eagar's informative piece here because
The Maui News does not, apparently, archive their articles.]
By HARRY EAGAR
Staff Writer
The Maui News KIHEI -- Which sounds better on the menu of a pricy, white-tablecloth restaurant? Hawaiian escolar or Ex-Lax fish?
It's the same fish. The one that is forbidden in Japan (a country that celebrates the often-deadly
fugu or blowfish), discouraged in Britain and blamed for epidemics of diarrhea in Australia. The same one that was temporarily banned in the 1990s by the Food and Drug Administration but is now promoted as gourmet eating across the United States and on Maui.
Sylvia Hewitt of Maui had an unpleasant encounter with the fish -- named
walu in Hawaiian -- at Nick's Fish Market, and again at the Maui Onion Grill at the Renaissance Wailea Resort. She did not suspect it was the fish until learning about it in
The Maui News earlier this month, and she says she definitely was not warned beforehand that it can cause acute distress in an uncertain but apparently substantial number of people who eat it.
A lot of people like
walu. In England it is sold (illegally) as expensive (and endangered) Chilean sea bass. Jeff Hanson, owner of Eskimo Candy Seafood in Kihei, says that he'd never heard of the fish until a couple of customers asked if he could get it for them.
"We serve it occasionally in our market," he says. "Some people are kind of sensitive, so we kind of tell people."
But his employees didn't tell me when I ordered it a couple of weeks ago. Executive chef George Gomes of Nick's and Sorrento's on the Beach said through a company spokeswoman that when it occasionally shows up on the menu, customers are cautioned. But Hewitt says she never was, and it ruined what was supposed to be a special (and expensive) night out.
Hawaiians knew better. They have a word,
maku`u, which is defined as explosive, uncontrollable bowel discharge caused by eating great quantities of
walu.
What constitutes a great quantity is undefined, but for some people it doesn't take much. An Austin, Texas food writer, Jill Posey-Smith, has been on a crusade to ban escolar for two years, since becoming sick for several days after eating it in a restaurant in St. Louis. Other foodies, like Jen Karetnick of
Miami New Times, have also publicized the dangers of eating
walu -- or escolar, white tuna, Hawaiian butter fish, rudderfish and ruddercod or cocco, other market names for fish from a family with the unmarketable family name of snake mackerels.
Alton Miyasaka of the Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources Aquatic Resources Division says, "We don't regulate their sale," but the Department of Health could.
"I would say," says Miyasaka, "that it's probably not good business to sell
food that makes people sick."
Eating fish in Hawaii carries a certain risk. Ciguatera poisoning of reef fish is a problem at times and places, and there is no way a consumer can tell whether a fish has picked up the poison except by eating it, Miyasaka says. (There is a test, but it costs more than the fish is worth, so nobody uses it. The official policy is, chance um.)
The Department of Health considers
walu "not a poison." Laura Lott of the Communications Office explains that in 1994, the FDA issued a directive banning the sale of escolar, but in 1997 the FDA revised its views, "stating that no regulatory action will be supported based on the
purgative effects of the fish."
Since then, DOH has advised local dealers to be careful of proper temperature control, since
walu is a histamine/scombrotoxin-forming species; and to pay attention to portion control and proper method of cooking. DOH forbids the use of "Hawaiian butter fish" as being misleading.
Gomes says it would normally be grilled and accompanied by an acid (citrus-based) sauce, to help drain out the indigestible oil. The fish, whose most common common name is oilfish, is full of waxy esters, which humans cannot handle. Australian health authorities have reported several instances where large numbers of people purged, apparently as a result of eating oilfish. (There are two species, found in deep tropical waters worldwide; the Hawaiian species is Ruvettus pretiosus.)
"It does have that reputation," says Miyasaka.
Brooks Takenaka, a manager at United Fishing Agency, which runs the Honolulu fish auction, says fishermen target
walu here, along with all other bottomfish. In other places, oilfish is a by-catch of tuna hunts. Local fishermen call it the Ex-Lax fish, he says. But "we don't toss 'em out."
Walu is "pretty highly priced" and available every day at the Honolulu auction. It brings from $2 to $4 a pound, sometimes a little more, at wholesale. Size and availability vary with the season. Landed fish in Hawaii range from four or five pounds to 20 or 30, although oilfish sold in Mexican markets can get much bigger, more than 100 pounds.
Right now is a low period for oilfish, says Takenaka. Takenaka says he considers it "a matter of responsibility for people who are in the know" to pass on information about what they sell.
"Number one, it is a fine line how much people can eat."
Hanson compares
walu to
aku. He does not go through the Honolulu auction, he says, and gets his fish direct from Maui and Big Island fishermen. That means he isn't offered much , but he has customers who ask for it. And, he says, they want it fresh. He knows that health authorities recommend freezing
aku, to kill parasites that can transfer to humans. But his customers wouldn't buy it if he froze it, he says.
"People eat what they want to eat."
Posey-Smith has another take on the matter. At her Web page devoted to damning escolar (
www.twistyfaster.com), she writes: "Sometimes seafood wholesalers, wrestling with thorny principles of supply and demand, feel unburdened by scruple. The chilling fact is, they just make stuff up in order to sell fish."
When she protested in St. Louis, the retailer told her that it was the "Gulf escolar" that caused the problem, and he sold only "Hawaiian escolar," the safe kind. In reality, Posey-Smith says, it's all the same, whether it's called scourfish or Hawaiian butter fish.
Her final word on the subject: "Remember to question fish authority."
