How to Kill a Fish

"The ray-finned saltwater fish known as the bonito is also called, by some fishermen I know, the tiger tuna-a nickname that refers to its taxonomy (bonito and tuna are in the same family) and to its iridescent blue-green stripes. Early one morning in late December, the sky was overcast on the waters off the coast of Dana Point, in Southern California's Orange County, and still the scales of a thrashing six-pound bonito, reeled in by the chef Junya Yamasaki, shimmered brilliantly."

"Then, with practiced ease, he used one hand to hold it by its gills and the other to drive a small metal stake between its eyes and directly into its brain-a technique known in Japan as ike jime. The bonito's body twitched until Yamasaki slid a thin metal wire down the column of its spinal cord, a second step called shinkei jime, which arrests its nervous system."

Bonito, a ray-finned saltwater fish also nicknamed tiger tuna, displays iridescent blue-green stripes. A six-pound bonito was reeled in off Dana Point and prepared immediately. The fish was killed using ike jime by driving a metal stake into the brain, followed by shinkei jime, inserting a thin wire down the spinal column to arrest the nervous system. The method is more humane than blunt trauma or suffocation, stems the release of stress hormones and decay chemicals, delays rigor mortis, extends freshness, and accentuates species-specific qualities such as firm silkiness in white fish and clean acidity in tuna. The technique is analogous to halal and kosher slaughter and has been taught to Southern California fishermen.

Read at The New Yorker