Fillet Recipes =)

Body

The body of a basa fish is stout and heavy. The rounded head is broader than it is long, the blunt snout having a white band on its muzzle.

Food and Spawning

Basa fish feed on plants. These fish spawn at the onset of the rainy season

"Catfish War" in the U.S.

In 2002, the United States accused Vietnam of dumping catfish, namely Pangasius bocourti and Pangasius hypophthalmus, on the American market, charging the Vietnamese importers who are subsidized by Vietnam's government of unfair competition.^[5][6] With pressures from the U.S. catfish industry, the United States Congress passed a law in 2003 preventing the imported fish from being labelled as catfish, as well as imposing additional tariffs on the imported fish.^[7] Under the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ruling, only species from the familyIctaluridae can be sold as true catfish.^[8] As a result, the Vietnamese exporters of this fish now label their products sold in the U.S. as basa fish or bocourti.^[9][10]

At the height of the "catfish war," U.S. catfish farmers and others were describing the imported catfish as an inferior product. However, researchers at the Mississippi State University show that in their experiment, imported basa were preferred in a taste test 3-to-1

Mascot

P. bocourti, known in Thai as pla mong, is the mascot of Nakhon Phanom Games, a regional multi-sport event in central Thailand in October 2006

Basa in the UK

Basa has become fairly common in the UK under the name Vietnamese river cobbler, mainly being sold through the large supermarkets in both fresh and frozen forms. It is marketed as a cheaper alternative to traditionally popular white fish, such as cod or haddock. Young's Bluecrest use it in some of their frozen fish products, choosing to use the name basa instead ofcobbler.

It has also been suggested by UK Trading Standards officers that cobbler is being fraudulently sold as cod by some fish and chip retailers in order to capitalise on the large difference in the wholesale price between the two, with cobbler being less than half the price of cod. This practice was highlighted by the successful prosecution of one retailer in July 2009

References

1. ^ ^{a b} "Pangasius bocourti". FishBase. Ed. Ranier Froese and Daniel Pauly. Mar 2007 version. N.p.: FishBase, 2007.
2. ^ "List of Fish Species which are, or may be, Aquacultured". Canadian Food Inspection Agency. 2008-06-09. Retrieved 2009-01-31.
3. ^ "Labelling (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2006 Fish Labelling (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2006". COT. 2007-05-26. Retrieved 2009-07-22.
4. ^ "Vietnam catfish farmers angered by French reports". Monsters and Critics. 2008-05-19. Retrieved 2009-01-31.
5. ^ "Delta Farmers Want Copyright on Catfish". New York Times. 2002-01-16. Retrieved 2009-01-31.
6. ^ "Food Fight: U.S. accuses Vietnam of dumping catfish on the American market". San Francisco Chronicle. 2003-02-08. Retrieved 2009-01-31.
7. ^ "Catfish by Any Other Name". Time. 2002-02-25. Retrieved 2009-01-31.
8. ^ "Basa/Swai". SeaFood Business magazine. Retrieved 2009-01-31.
9. ^ "Buyer's Guide: Basa Catfish". SeaFood Business magazine. 2001-11. Retrieved 2007-03-31.
10. ^ "A Catfish by Any Other Name". New York Times. 2008-10-09. Retrieved 2009-01-31.
11. ^ "Vietnam has tastier fish than US: studies". Independent Online. 2005-07-19. Retrieved 2009-01-31.
12. ^ Mascot page (in Thai), Nakhon Phanom Games official website, 6 December 2006
13. ^ "Fish and chip shops accused of selling Vietnamese cobbler as cod". Times Online. 2009-07-13. Retrieved 2009-07-22.

External links

Wikispecies has information related to: Pangasius bocourti

This catfish-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.