"Awat ta tits !!! Butete kang Daku" , - in English, " You can't fool me, you're a big blowfish"...
A week ago, we went to Dapitan, Zamboanga del Norte, for our monthly medical mission in a nearby barangay of Sibutad, and the day after, our group went on a side trip to Dakak Park and Beach Resort and also did some pasalubong hunting in Dapitan
Public Market. My wife bought some dried fish which she said was cheap compared to prices in our city and that it is quiet fresh and meaty. That's the picture above which is around 1 kilo at 100 pesos per kilo. The next day my wife cooked some for breakfast and it really looked delicious with its meaty part and I ate some dipped in spicy vinegar, also my wife took some big portion and loudly proclaiming that it was really good.. But my son took noticed of the fins and rightly blurted out that's a puffer fish!!!!. Well, we stopped eating and hence the picture...I just don't know what species of puffer fish this is considering that there are 120 species of puffer that live mostly in tropical seas.. It is commonly called butete, tikong in Cebu area, is abundant in Philippine seas. They are aptly named because of their defensive action of inflating themselves with water or air when threatened to make difficult for predator to swallow. Their toxin called tetrodotoxin is mostly located in the liver, testes,ovaries and eggs. The Japanese consider this as a delicacy and even have licensing for chef for preparing this.
Symptoms of tetrodotoxin poisoning is said to occur within fifteen minutes to several hours after eating the puffer fish. Feeling like floating, nausea, vomiting and stomach pain is experienced, lips would feel numb or itchy. Now, this dried fish is in the freezer awaiting further research, meantime, I will have to be content with the familiar dried fish sold in our city..the safest is the fish called "bolinao" which is fondly called "lansang", nails in English..By the way, which is safer to eat, a puffer or a nail???
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