Doesn’t every such survey always find that a huge percentage of fish is mislabeled?
Does it?
I must admit, I have not read every such survey.
I thought this was gonna be a repeat of the same news from a few years back, but reading it, it seems the problem has gotten even worse than when this sort of thing made the rounds last time.
It’s not surprising at this point. Once Patagonian Toothfish became Chilean Sea Bass, all bets are off. It would be nice if there were some sort of agreed-upon standard nomenclature that didn’t get all latin on folks.
I wonder how this plays out in other cities? I assume it’s pretty wide spread since most of the mislabeling happens farther up the chain.
Does, say, Vancouver or Tokyo have this issue to this extent?
Ditto, All the “red snapper” out there is likely farmed tilapia…
I’m glad I don’t like red snapper or halibut… and red snapper doesn’t taste anything like tilapia btw.
I have this vision of kids generations from now being incredulous upon learning that humans once ate those weird, slimy creatures that live in the sea. I love fish, but they’re bad news.
This what I’m referring to Tilapia marketed at Red Snapper; been happening for at least a decade. Buyer beware.
Not too surprising. There are big profits to be made when advertising a cheaper fish as a more expensive fish. In grocery stores, most people can’t tell the difference between the fillets. Not that many people actually know how the fish look like.
At the sushi bar, here is nothing more fascinating than a piece of misuteri nigiri !!!
That’s not true. Cheap places use Tilapia. I haven’t seen it any of the better Sushi bars I’ve been to in LA. It’s easy to identify because of the color of the flesh from the skin-side of a fillet.
Part of it is a nomenclature issue. Many Sushi bars call “Tai” or “Madai”, “Red Snapper.” Tai and Madai are Breams, which explains the mislabeling in the article.
You don’t like huachinango? Seriously?
I’ve had sushi only twice in this city since Ike shut down his Sunset shop. Shit like this is a big reason why, species collapsing is another. 1 of the 2 times was at Ike’s new joint lol
Let’s not forget red snapper is illegal to fish around here, so a lot of local rockfish is used as well… which is great… farmed tilapia is fuckin horrible… but i’m pretty sure i can tell easily between tilapia and rockfish (red snapper is a red rockfish)
That does look like red snapper. But tilapia doesn’t have much flavor and snapper does. Wouldn’t people know when they taste it?
Not if you mask it in a poke’ or include as part of AYCE 
The positive, probably helping to keep red snapper, halibut, “insert any white fish” from going extinct. Tilapia is extremely hardy and easy to breed. The downside, my momma and Japanese friends always told me never to eat raw fresh water fish, something to do about parasites…however I understand deep freezing is effective in killing majority of them.
You’re right and it’s probably just me. Since I don’t like the flavor of snapper I can taste it right away.
@robert - nope. I don’t hate it. But it has a strong flavor that I don’t care for and it’s texture isn’t so great. I don’t think I’ve had it raw though - mostly cooked with tomatoes and such.
Very clever
[quote=“Sgee, post:14, topic:4933”]
Tilapia is extremely hardy
[/quote]That’s what makes it a good fryer. It doesn’t fall apart.
Red rock cods or rockfish are erroenously called red snapper. True red snapper isn’t even found off the coast of California. And Red Rock Cod or any rock cod or red rockfish found in California is a completely different species than true Red Snapper.
Red snapper is part of the Lutjanus genus. California rockfishes are part of the Sebastes genus. They are not in the same family of fish.
This red rock, red snapper, rock your red rock genus sebastes, etc. is confusing me. I’m glad I don’t like the stuff and don’t have to panic when trying to order it. But I have a question.
[quote=“mhlee, post:18, topic:4933”]
True red snapper isn’t even found off the coast of California.
[/quote]Where is it found then? When I lived in Massachusetts it was all over the place. It was not rare or particularly expensive. It was a mid-level fish. But judging from this board, Californians see it as a superior fish, or am I wrong?
Gulf of Mexico / Florida AFAIK