There are guilty pleasures in life. For some, it’s smoking a cigarette from time to time, or downing a tub of ice cream in one go. For others, it’s more like watching a bad TV series, but which allows you to not think about anything else. There is another category, much darker and more obscure: surimi stick eaters.
Whether you taste it as a guilty pleasure or simply out of desire, surimi – let’s be honest – has a funny face. Tinted an unnatural orange-pink, its half-rubbery, half-melting texture has no equivalent on this earth. A strange appearance and a crab taste that does not suit everyone, to the point that a real demonization of surimi is in full swing. A simple dirty-mouth crime, or is surimi as chemical as it looks?
Fish flesh or… poison?
Originally, surimi comes to us from Japan, where it bears the name “kamaboko”literally “fish flesh”. You will have understood, its basic composition is fish. Lots of fish. However, upon its arrival in Europe in the 1980s, food manufacturers modified the recipe somewhat. Let’s just say they took some liberties. And in their revisited version, there is a catch: fish meat, too expensive, no longer really has its place.
So how much fish is actually in a stick of surimi? The Afnor NF V45-068 voluntary standard requires at least… 30% fish or cephalopod mollusk flesh to be able to bear the term “surimi”. And many do not hesitate to flirt with the limit, as for the discount sticks from Auchan, which contain only 28.9%, according to an article in RMC Conso from May 2024. On the Fleury Michon side and its version “Le Moelleux”, it is necessary to count 38%. Honorable mention with the “Supremes” from the Coraya brand, which contain around 46%. Less than half a stick then.
What about the remaining percentages? Rest assured, manufacturers know how to replace noble ingredients with less expensive components. Here, we are mainly talking about adding water and starch, but also sugar and salt, as well as… additives or cosmetic agents to improve taste, texture and color.
And times seem tough for surimi lovers. Because the more time passes, the more the fish flesh dies in the orange sticks. Between 2021 and 2023, the Fleury Michon company, for example, reduced the key ingredient in its recipe by 11%, replacing it with much less expensive components. A typical case of “cheapflation”, which therefore consists of modifying the composition of a product in order to lower its production cost.
But this has not stopped food manufacturers from selling more than 40,000 tonnes of surimi each year since 2019, all brands combined. However, the trend has been downward for five years: 45,620 tonnes sold in 2020, compared to 34,942 tonnes in 2024, according to figures from FranceAgriMer (PDF), the National Establishment for Agricultural and Seafood Products.
No crab in it, only taste (added)
A first question has already been raised: yes, surimi is an ultra-processed product, entirely designed by the food industry to appeal to the consumer. And at a lower cost if possible. In addition, it is an ultra-processed product that does not contain… not a single piece of crab, because the latter is too expensive. No luck, for a product with a crab taste.
For high-end brands like Coraya and Fleury Michon, this fake taste is added using natural flavorings. On the other hand, for discount products, we often find traces of monosodium glutamate, a flavor enhancer considered potentially dangerous for health. Low-end surimi may also contain sorbitol and polyphosphates, considered potential endocrine disruptors. The guilty pleasure is starting to seriously turn sour.
Add to this that these little sticks often contain too much salt, which promotes water retention, or that they do not even have any particular nutritional benefit, unlike real fish. So you know pretty much everything about surimi. Well almost.
Surimi, the hell of the oceans
Several scientific investigations have pointed out another problem with these small sticks which nevertheless seem harmless: they have a high environmental impact. In the line of sight, the opacity on their origin. It is often impossible to know exactly where and how the fish meat of surimis – often Alaskan quail, white hake or Pacific hake – was caught. The door open to all excesses.
An environmental black spot which has already placed these sticks at the heart of several controversies, notably when the spotlight was focused in February 2024 on the pelagic trawler Annelies Ilenaoperated by the Saint-Malo Fishing Company (Ille-et-Vilaine). This factory ship can catch up to 400 tonnes of fish per day to transform them into surimi paste directly on board. Quantities as pharaonic as they are devastating for the environment.
What can we conclude from all this information? Already, surimi, although criticized and open to criticism, is not prohibited for consumption. There are some foods that are best eaten in moderation for your health. But also those that are better to ban, if the ecological factor is dear to you. The perfect definition of guilty pleasures.
