This image shows a box of maboya, Halocynthia roretzi, at one of the intermediate wholesaler stands at the Tsukiji Metropolitan Fish Market in Tokyo, Japan. These are ascidians (generic Japanese name: hoya) . They are in the taxonomic class ascidiacea. This name comes from the Greek 'asci' which means bag or bladder. They are also known as tunicates because their body is encased in a tunic or a test. As swimming larvae these animals possess a notochord but this is lost when they settle on a substrate. These ascidians are cultivated in Korea and Japan where they are prized as food. Another ascidian species is eaten in the South of France and I have also seen ascidians for sale in restaurants in Brussels. Author Alan Davidson who wrote "Mediterranean Seafood" states that the Mediterranean species that he ate "tasted quite good" and looked "like scrambled eggs". He cut open the tunic or test to eat the "yellow part" inside the animal. I have never knowingly eaten them myself. Photographed in December 1988.
File No. 1288 29
©RLLord
fishinfo@guernsey.net

This image shows a box of maboya, Halocynthia roretzi, at one of the intermediate wholesaler stands at the Tsukiji Metropolitan Fish Market in Tokyo, Japan. These are ascidians (generic Japanese name: hoya) . They are in the taxonomic class ascidiacea. This name comes from the Greek 'asci' which means bag or bladder. They are also known as tunicates because their body is encased in a tunic or a test. As swimming larvae these animals possess a notochord but this is lost when they settle on a substrate. These ascidians are cultivated in Korea and Japan where they are prized as food. Another ascidian species is eaten in the South of France and I have also seen ascidians for sale in restaurants in Brussels. Author Alan Davidson who wrote "Mediterranean Seafood" states that the Mediterranean species that he ate "tasted quite good" and looked "like scrambled eggs". He cut open the tunic or test to eat the "yellow part" inside the animal. I have never knowingly eaten them myself. Photographed in December 1988.
File No. 1288 29
©RLLord
fishinfo@guernsey.net