JELLYFISH, A NEW FOOD RESOURCE FOR THE EUROPEAN MARKET

Jellyfish have been considered as food for more than thousand years in Asia, where a multi-phase processing consisting on mixtures of salt and alum are used as traditional procedure. Jellyfish could also become an attractive choice for western food market for many reasons. The need for fishery diversification and for new food resources, the increasing market demand for innovative food products or ingredients, and finally the great availability of a resource whose use would be economically profitable and environmentally sustainable, make jellyfish a good candidate for future exploitation. However, in the attempt to introduce jellyfish as a new food product in Western market, several issues should be considered. Within the EU Project "GoJelly", we are continuing studies on "western style" jellyfish food. Protocols and treatments currently used for fish and sea-foods preparation are under consideration as a starting point to develop ad hoc new handling and storage procedures from fishing to on-boat pre-treatment and new processing methods will be developed to optimize taste, texture, flavor and shelf-life of final products acceptable for European consumers. Moreover, these new practices will be addressed also to maintain or enhance nutritional traits of formulated jellyfish products. In addition, study on the identification of strategies to reduce spoilage and to individuate possible food-borne microbial pathogens have been started up. The setting up of diagnostic and analytical assays to define consumers risk assessment and to monitor safety threat during jellyfish processing steps for preparation of food for human consumption is also in progress.