A Twisted Tale of Spicy Tuna Rolls

Healthy ingredients, unhealthy trip to your table.On April 11th federal authorities received reports that people were getting violently ill after eating spicy tuna rolls in New York. Then reports started coming in from all over the place--Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Washington, D.C., Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin. People in multiple states were experiencing the extreme gastrointestinal symptoms of salmonella poisoning after eating dishes with raw tuna including spicy tuna rolls and seviche. The resulting investigation lifts the veil on the origins of that pretty plate of sushi.

The fish was cleaned and frozen in India, shipped to a supplier in Cupertino, California and then sent to restaurants around the U.S.

There's no word yet on where the tuna in question was caught, but it was originally cleaned at a processing plant in India, according to the Centers for Disease Control. This particular toxic fish was chopped yellowfin tuna, called Nakaochi Scrape, which is literally scraped from fish bones. After being scraped from tuna bones, the fish was frozen in India and shipped to a supplier in Cupertino, California called Moon Marine. From there it was shipped, presumably still frozen, to far-flung restaurants where the tuna was thawed, mixed with spices in the case of spicy tuna rolls and served raw to people who then became deathly ill.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Moon Marine USA has begun recalling 58,828 pounds of raw yellowfin tuna because it may be contaminated--a somewhat mind-boggling quantity of fish. An FDA spokesman said it was unclear how much of the tuna might still be on the market. 

Should we be surprised that quality is compromised when nearly 30 tons of fish travels 11,000 miles, thawed and served raw? The fact is this is considered standard practice in the fish industry. Perhaps the only surprise here is that more people don't get sick every day.