We visit the fish port at 4am to buy fresh fish without formalin preservative poisons
My cook and I visited the Paranaque fish port at 4am yesterday Saturday with the goal of getting big discounts, buying fresher fish than the wet market, and buying un-poisoned fish – fish without formalin and food coloring which is allegedly popular when dead ocean fish is transported from the fish ports to the wet markets.
My principle in choosing sea food, is it should be sea food – not farmed in fish ponds – I mean ocean wild food. I believe that our oceans are one of the last bastions of superior nutrition left on this planet. The oceans are certainly more nutritious than the overly farmed lands of the planet. Land animals will only be as healthy as the soil they live on. But how many wild forest animals are available in our markets? None really. But ocean animals… we have them in abundance.
My cook and I left home around 3:10 am. We arrived at the Paranaque fish port at 4am. still dark. We immediately had a parking spot waiting for us. We had a styrofoam container with us. I had 2,500 pesos budget and we finished it all that day. We were greeted at the entrance with a man selling fresh large whole tuna, tangigue, dorado and some normal sized squid. Inside there was more, more, more… it was mayhem. Informal sellers everywhere, barking, pushing pails, lifting wholesale amounts. Most buyers were re-sellers in the markets, we were just buying for personal consumption, but we had a big house hold so we sort of qualify. Maybe the budget of P 2,500 pesos will last us for 2 weeks?
What were we able to buy? A 7 kilo yellow fin tuna never blast frozen, a whole tangigue, a whole dinorado, some squid, some small octopus, an eel, many different types of smaller sea fish. I’m glad our cook was with me, she knew what was fresh and what was not. It was a wet affair. I think we need to wear boots next time. My rubber shoes need washing.
We later explored the Bacoor Cavite wet market and found it bountiful with sea food as well. It was just for exploration purposes, I didn’t have any money left. I just bought 3 kilos of cauliflower.
We were home 6am. Had to have the fish cleaned and prepared for storage.
At 9am I had the cook prepare a cooked coconut milk meal with the eel. “Ginataang igat / palos”.  It was my first time to eat eel so forgive me if I have to cook it first time. After that I took a nap
At lunch we cooked the stew of the little octopus with its black ink. Along with the cauliflower we made into “rice” for the children. And the fresh raw tuna for sashimi.
Ah yes… tuna sashimi that was never blast frozen tastes bloody great. I pigged out.
At dinner I just had a mango to socialize with the family. I was still stuffed.
It was a rewarding but very tiring day. I think I should only do that once a month. We will see. I have some pictures of our bounty!
