Sungayan, A Mythical Fish

Unicorn is a mythical one-horned creature, one that lives only in fairy tales. But what about a one-horned creature that is realistic and lives in the sea?

My husband came home bringing two large fish and tell me to cook it for dinner. I was surprised with a weird looking fish i saw! I asked him what kind of fish it was but he gave me a confused response. Well, he was told it was an “ isda sa bato “ or a fish that is found in the coral reef.

Wondering what it really was, I searched the net for an answer. And behold! I was amazed to know that it was called unicorn fish ! The name was very obvious since the fish has a one horn in the middle of its forehead!

It also has a thick leathery skin. The scales were very fine. On its tail were two sharp fin. Though the fish is not aggressive, they use the sharp fins to defend itself to predators.

Unicorn fish lives in the coral reefs in Indo-Pacific ocean and very popular in Maldives. In the Philippines, it is called Sungayan or Sinungay which means “ horned “ .

Though the Philippine sea is also home to these variety of fish, it is seldom sold in the market because it is hard to catch. Fishermen use spear inorder to catch them. They are also fast swimmers making it harder to get them.

Wow, the reason this fish is a bit expensive! Just right for the fishermen’s hard work.

So, what do i do with these?

Well since the fish has hard skin as I mentioned earlier, and you need to boil or steam to remove the scales, the easiest recipe is to grill it! However, since it is raining as a typhoon is on its way, our griller and the coals were soaked wet. I decided to just grill it in the wok, just like what i did with the milk fish I featured before.

Preparation

I was happy since the fish gills and its intestines were already removed by the vendor. So i just wash them in running water. I added salt and tanglad or lemongrass in its stomach for aroma and flavour. The lemongrass is also a way to lessen the lansa or the fish smell.