Japanese Food trivia
Mood:  silly
I am reading a Dictionary of Japanese Foods in my spare time and will try to add a few tidbits - hah for your reading pleasure.
shamisengai
"Tongue clam, lamp shell Lingula jaspidea. This brachiopod, strictly speaking not a shell fish, belongs to the oldest living genus of animals, almost unchanged for 500,00 years. A greenish color, about 3 cm. long with a peduncle about 5 cm. long, it is harvested in quantity from the Ariake Sea in northwestern Kyushu. It tastes peculiar rather than delicious and some people come out in a rash when they eat it. Eleven species of Lingula, some quite large, live in Japanese waters, but after surviving since the Cambrian period, are now being wiped out by pollution." How sad.