She’s a doctor, she should know. Indeed, at a high-end sushi bar recently, I found a tiny worm under a piece of sashimi—still wriggling.
I had gotten to know the chef who served it to me and I liked him. I also knew him to be conscientious. I felt torn, because part of me thought he should know about the parasite, so he’d be more vigilant in the future.
In The Zen of Fish I describe the 2,000 cases of anisakis worm illness that Japanese sushi eaters get every year. I also mention a museum in Tokyo dedicated to parasites, which has on display a tapeworm taken from the bowels of a man who’d eaten raw trout. The worm is 30 feet long.
Sushi chefs have special techniques to avoid passing parasites on to their customers, which I also describe in the book. But these techniques don’t always work, as evidenced by the worm on my plate.
I decided not to say anything about the worm, mostly because it would have been so embarrassing for the chef ... and, I suppose, because I was on a date with a woman I had brought there to impress.
When the chef wasn’t looking I tried to hide the squirming critter under a piece of garnish. Later I wondered if I should have left it out in the open but pretended not to notice, so he might see it without losing face.
At any rate, I hope Scrubs fans have been reminded that eating raw fish carries risks. Then again, a person can get an E. coli infection from eating salad greens. As for fitting into your wedding dress ... I’d go with Atkins.
[P.S. Read my blog entry about visiting the set of Scrubs in L.A.]
