Let us guess, you love sushi, and you love salmon. And you are wondering whether you can or can’t make a more affordable version of the popular Japanese dish at home using salmon. We get it, overcooked salmon is not good to eat, so you are wondering if you can just eliminate the hustle of cooking it all together and can eat salmon raw. This is a fair question, the answer to which you are going to get in this article.
Can You Eat Salmon Raw
As it turns out, you can eat raw salmon and other fish without getting sick. Our ancestors at one point had no idea what cooking is and they ate raw fish. It’s been so many years since that, we discovered cooking, yet people continue to eat raw fish, probably because it is delicious and quite safe when done right.
Japan isn’t the only place where people love to eat raw fish; there are a ton of other nations that has their own beloved raw fish dish. You can eat poke from Hawaii, gravlax from Norway, and carpaccio from Italy if you want to get a taste of raw fish dishes from around the world.
So, it is pretty safe to assume that raw salmon is not toxic for humans at all. You can probably get salmon sushi at your favorite local sushi place. However, there might be certain risks involved when it comes to you just buying salmon that was intended to be consumed after cooking and eating it raw.
Benefits of Eating Your Salmon Raw
Salmon and much other fish have quite delicate flesh. Hence when they are overcooked, they tend to turn into a dry and unpleasant texture. This is why just from a sensory point of view, it is much more pleasant to eat raw salmon since you can enjoy a refreshing flavor and soft texture in raw salmon.
On the health side of benefits, as you know one main reason we should eat fish is that fit contains omega 3 fatty acids, which is very good for your health. Cooking fish reduces the amount of this element in the fish. That is why, you can argue, that raw fish contains more healthy ingredients than cooked fish.
Possible Risks of Eating Raw Salmon or Other Fish
There is a difference between eating raw salmon prepared by professional chefs and eating salmon raw you bought a couple of days ago from the supermarket. Fish is a very good environment for microorganisms to grow, and not all of the microorganisms that grow on your fish will be as friendly to your stomach as the kinds of microorganisms that can be found in yogurt.
During cooking, due to the intense heat, most of the harmful microorganisms that could cause various diseases to get killed or at least gets inactivated. That’s why cooked food is safe to eat. However, in raw salmon, those potential disease-carrying microorganisms will very much be alive and have a very good chance of entering your body and getting you sick.
Some of the potential diseases that you have the risk of suffering from if you eat raw salmon or other raw fish are food poisoning, liver diseases, salmonella, and diarrhea to name a few. In fact, the risk of catching a parasitic disease is most likely from eating raw fish. Fish that is not processed properly and kept in unhygienic conditions are most likely to be the carrier of these kinds of diseases.
Any pollutant that you might come across while eating your food is also a common occurrence that you are going to have to get used to when you eat raw salmon. Raw salmon has a higher chance of containing many pollutants and heavy metals like mercury and POP. These pollutants can lead to quite serious diseases including cancer, diabetes, and heavy metal poisoning.
Conclusion
Now that you know both the benefits and the risks behind eating raw fish, you can decide yourself if it is worth it or not. We think as long as you stick to eating raw fish from reputed restaurants, you will be able to enjoy its benefits without having to worry about the negative consequences. And about the price, just limit your restaurant rips, that way you will be able to enjoy your favorite dish without emptying your wallet.