rockfish for sashimi

Just curious guys,  can you make sashimi out of the different kinds of rockfish.?..

 This should be in the "general" topics.
 You can but they commonly have parasites. This has been a big topic of discussion on this website.  Here is a DFG link that was posted. You can also search here under parasites for more threads on the subject. http://www.dfg.ca.gov/mrd/parasites.html

 (Quote from Bluefin17)--Sean said, nematode worms are in most fish.  Rockfish, lingcod, halibut, cabezon and to a lesser degree salmon.  These parasites are waiting to get into a marine mammal (or bird?) to reproduce.  They are not in a mature stage until they do.  They coil up and "wait" in the muscle tissue.  According to Milton Love down at UCSB (he's a rockfish expert and author of that huge rockfish book) certain areas will have certain species which seem to have more parasites.  Which means that while one area has a high concentration of worms in one species, that doesn't mean that it will be that way at another spot.  Also, the older certain rockfish in certain areas are, the more worms/parasites there might be.  Sometimes I've caught huge blacks (5-6 lb.) and no worms hardly at all, other times in the same area, caught more big blacks and they were all loaded with worms.  Usually if I've kept the fish, I'll clean the worms out (not letting my wife see) and freeze those fillets, then cook them.  The nematode worms are absolutely harmless if frozen or cooked thoroughly.  The possible result of eating a nematode worm if it was alive is having it cyst in your head or upper body muscle tissue, but that shouldn't happen because you've cooked it thoroughly or frozen it.  All my information comes from Dr. Gary Hendrickson, fish pathology professor at Humboldt State University who used to always say, "Rockfish or lingcod ceviche/sushi/sashimi probably isn't the best idea going."

thanks for the info fishshim...really love to eat sashimi esp...salmon...guess i have to be more careful

"Rockfish or lingcod ceviche/sushi/sashimi probably isn't the best idea going."

I like to make ceviche out of rock fish, but I always vacuum seal and freeze the fish for a week before I use it. I do this based on some research discussions that I dug up on a UC Davis website a few years ago. I can't seem to find the original location where I saw this recommendation clearly stated, but the following link discusses it: http://seafood.ucdavis.edu/pubs/nematodes.htm

Even in the worst case described in the link above, it sounds to me that if you freeze your fish, something like 1.5% of the nematodes may survive after 24 hours of freezing. My hope is that longer freezing and the 12 hour soak in lime juice (acidity) for the ceviche is enough to kill those last few that may occasionally survive. Either way I figure I'm at least taking an educated risk.

If you want to do sashimi, and are willing to take the risk (1.5% survive after 24 hours of freezing according to one study), maybe the long term freezing is a good way to go.

The worms are very visible if you cut the meat thin for sashimi.  Also you need to use a chest freezer (0'F) rather than a fridge freezer (~20'F).  As a bonus, half frozen fillets are very easy to cut into perfect sashimi slices.  I've only sashimi'd one vermillion rockfish and it was very good.  I picked out a fillet that was the cleanest from all the fish I'd caught that day.

If you get a worm, you'll know it right away when it starts burrowing into the lining of your stomach.  Intense stomach cramps and vomiting usually occurs within hours of eating one of the buggers.  Go to the hospital ASAP and they'll remove the worm.

2 Years ago, I caught this vermilion in Fort Ross and had it prepared sashimi style by one of my regular sushi joints. I watched the sushi man prepare the fish as he sliced it THIN and held each fillet toward the light to see if there were any visible worms. He gave it the green light and my friends and I enjoyed it very much. Would I do it again....most likely not. We were just curious to see what it would taste like 

Personally I'd only take the green light from a Japanese sushi chef   

How when and where do those nematodes procreate anyway? It's probably what you can't see that'll get you



I have to confess I used to eat parts of my salmon raw without freezing it first  I told our local Japanese grocer that and he gave me one of those looks like That explains a lot 

Personally I think freezing ruins the quality of sashimi. I always cook rock fish and also don't tell my wife when I see worms when cleaning fish. yellow tail is the tougher call for me since it is such a primo sashimi fish (hamachi) and can also be prone to worms.

Scott

I was told by a Chinese friend that you were supposed to freeze the fish in a freezer that goes to minus 5 degrees (colder than a typical freezer) to kill the parasites. He actually had a double sided freezer that one side was minus 5 for freezing fish for sashimi.

thanks for the replies guy...I'd always use to sashimi my salmons after filleting them and putting them in the reg. ref freezer...never got sick but now I'm thinking twice about it....saw the picture that mooch posted and I thought it is a general practice to sashimi rockfishes...maybe not!

On my trip to Alaska we had sashimi from lingcod, and convinced ourselves that the gratuitous amount of alcohol consumed would kill off any parasite.  Not one of my smartest moves, but nobody got sick.  Once again, thank God for Jack Daniels!
-beenfishin

Once again, thank God for Jack Daniels!
-beenfishin

Funny. I bet you're like me, the next day you're cursing god for Jack Daniels.

Z