Fugu or blowfish is on the list of The World’s Most Dangerous Foods including Monkey Brains as well.

The fish contains fatal poison especially in the liver. The toxin is so strong that a lethal dose is smaller

than the head of a pin, and a single fish has enough poison to kill 30 people.

In Japan it is expensive delicacy in winter. Fillets of fugu can be eaten fried and raw.

It tastes more like chicken than fish. As a single mistake in preparation could be fatal.

It is served by only highly trained and licensed chefs. So fugu poising incidents are quite rare.

Japanese people’s love for fugu with its chicken-like taste

and slightly chewy texture has a long history.

It has been eaten in Japan since about B.C 10,000.

The Tokugawa shogunate (1603–1868) prohibited eating of fugu.

It became popular again as the shogunate power waned.

In western regions of Japan, where the government’s influence was weaker

and fugu was easier to get,cooking methods were developed for safely eating the fish.

When served raw, its flesh is carefully sliced so thinly

that you can see the patterns of the plate underneath the semi-transparent fish.

Fugusashi shortened for fugu sashimi is worth seeing and tasting.

Fugu consumption in Japan is declining now.

According to the statistics, 2015 consumption has fallen by about 40% over past ten years.

It’s pointed out that the younger generation think of the winter delicacy as one for the older,

but not for them.

Maybe they are not willing to risk their life for eating fugu

which is too expensive and too plain to satisfy their appetite.