Yamaguchi #2: What’s a Fugu Cream Croquette Hamburger?

April 2009

Almost every area of Japan has a special food product. Moji, for example, invented Yaki Curry, which was basically a normal Japanese curry with an over easy egg and a ton of melted cheese added to it. I ate this the first night of my vacation. It was incredibly rich, but oh, so good. I try to make a point of finding out what the special food of an area is and sampling it. It adds something to the trip.



The specialty of Shimonoseki was fugu, the infamous poisonous puffer fish.

I wasn’t afraid to eat fugu because of the poison. Nowadays, the risk of dying is negligible. What scared me was the price. I’d heard that fugu could go upwards of 10,000 yen ($100) and that, adding insult to injury, it wasn’t very tasty, either.

But I guess that’s only if you go for the very nice, traditional fugu meals. If you get creative, you can still eat it for cheap.



I found a small restaurant at the fish market called, “It’s Christmas.” The name alone would have enticed me to eat there. But in addition to this, they were also advertising a “Fugu Cream Croquette Hamburger” for less than 1,000 yen ($10). I had to try it.

So, what is a Fugu Cream Croquette Hamburger? Well, first of all, do you know what a Croquette is? (No, it’s not the game they play with flamingos and hedgehogs in Alice in Wonderland.) A Croquette is a patty of usually a soft or creamy substance, such as mashed potatoes or creamed pumpkin, that is then breaded and deep-fried. It’s quite common in Japan. In this case it was fugu that had been creamed and made into a patty. This special Croquette was then stuck between two buns, like any normal hamburger. All in all, it sort of resembled a fish filet, but not so fishy. The cream was strong.

Although it seems like its almost cheating, I’m going to add fugu to my list of weird Japanese foods I’ve eaten, along with beef intestines, raw chicken, and natto, which is fermented soybeans. (The natto is definitely the most disgusting.)