If Sushi's Your Turkey Cure, Steer Clear of 'Ex-Lax Fish'

There’s likely to come a point in the next few days when you’re sick of turkey, but if sushi is your proposed cure, be sure to steer clear of a fish that comes with a side of anal seepage: escolar. Sometimes seen on menus as “white tuna,” and known to detractors as the “Ex-Lax fish,” the buttery species often ends up in tuna nets—and, Mother Jones reports, the industry is trying to position it for popularity.

The escolar’s rich taste comes in part from an oil that’s indigestible to humans; hence the seepage. But the fishing PR machine has successfully gotten another once-undesirable tuna bycatch— Patagonian toothfish—into your city’s top restaurants. You likely know it better as Chilean sea bass, which is now overfished after that top-notch 1970s rebranding effort.
(More escolar stories.)