A living fossil of hundreds of millions of years! How much is Chinese horseshoe crab per jin? Is the horseshoe crab a protected animal? Can the Chinese horseshoe crab be eaten?

The Chinese horseshoe crab has high medicinal value, and it is also a very delicious ingredient itself, very suitable for friends who love good food. So let's go take a look at how much the Chinese horseshoe crab costs per jin. How do you eat the Chinese horseshoe crab?

How much is the Chinese horseshoe crab per jin

The current market price of horseshoe crab is roughly 200—300 yuan per jin.

The Chinese horseshoe crab is a national second-class protected animal, and any unit or individual is prohibited from illegally hunting, purchasing, processing or carrying it. It cannot be eaten! Catching it is now illegal in China, except for the research and production of horseshoe crab reagent.

Horseshoe crabs appeared hundreds of millions of years ago and have been able to reproduce without decline. On the one hand, this is because horseshoe crabs themselves have a strong reproductive capacity; on the other hand, because horseshoe crab meat has a poor taste, and eating juvenile Chinese horseshoe crabs can easily cause body allergies and toxic shock, and because of the special physiological and toxicological properties of horseshoe crabs, they have always been rarely hunted by people. However, in recent years, because some people have not truly realized the consequences of eating horseshoe crabs, there are still people buying and selling them in the black market

What medicinal value does the Chinese horseshoe crab have

The horseshoe crab (horseshoecrab) is a type of animal as ancient as the trilobite (now only fossils remain). The ancestors of the horseshoe crab appeared in the Devonian period of the Paleozoic era in geological history. At that time, dinosaurs had not yet risen and primitive fish had just appeared. As time passed, the animals of its era either evolved or went extinct, and only the horseshoe crab, which appeared more than 400 million years ago, still retains its primitive and ancient appearance to this day, so the horseshoe crab is called a “living fossil.”

How much is the Chinese horseshoe crab per jin? What medicinal value does the Chinese horseshoe crab have

The earliest horseshoe crab fossils are found in the Ordovician period (505 million——438 million years ago), and horseshoe crab fossils similar in form to modern horseshoe crabs appeared in the Jurassic period (208 million——144 million years ago).

It has high medicinal value.

In the 1850s, scientists discovered a coagulant in the grayish-blue blood of horseshoe crabs, called horseshoe crab reagent (Limulusamoebocytelysate, LAL), which can react with fungi and endotoxin substances and condense a thick layer of gel around these invading substances. The result is obvious: it is a simple and foolproof method for detecting whether drugs and medical supplies contain impurities. At present, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a total of five companies to produce and sell horseshoe crab reagent, and the American pharmaceutical company CharlesRiver is one of them. They extract the blood of horseshoe crabs and make it into a reagent that can detect bacteria and other contaminants at levels as low as one part per trillion. It is worth mentioning that horseshoe crabs do not die because of blood extraction.

Can horseshoe crabs be eaten

Horseshoe crabs can be eaten, but they are a nationally protected animal, and eating them is no longer allowed now.

Now, apart from being used for the research and production of horseshoe crab reagent, catching horseshoe crabs is illegal in China. The Chinese horseshoe crab has high medicinal value. Meat——pungent, salty, neutral; clears heat and detoxifies, can improve eyesight, and treats glaucoma and impetigo. Shell——salty, neutral; activates blood and removes stasis, and has a detoxifying effect; contains bromine, iron, zinc, copper, nickel, manganese, calcium, titanium, chlorine, sulfur, silicon, aluminum, magnesium and other elements; mainly treats bruises, traumatic bleeding, scalds and sores. Tail——salty, warm; has an astringent and hemostatic effect, and is used to treat pulmonary tuberculosis hemoptysis and sores.

Fishermen who catch Chinese horseshoe crabs generally catch the females first, because the Chinese horseshoe crab also has another name, “mandarin ducks of the sea,” which means that under normal circumstances they appear in male-female pairs. A female Chinese horseshoe crab moving alone can generally attract many male Chinese horseshoe crabs. And usually the larger female Chinese horseshoe crab carries the male on its back; female horseshoe crabs are all larger than male horseshoe crabs. In the world of Chinese horseshoe crabs, female Chinese horseshoe crabs are very rare.

Introduction to ways of eating horseshoe crab

1. Steamed Chinese horseshoe crab

Main ingredient: 1000g Chinese horseshoe crab

Auxiliary ingredient: 10g salt

Steps:

1. Buy a fresh Chinese horseshoe crab, slaughter it and clean it thoroughly.

2. Rinse the Chinese horseshoe crab clean under running water, put the washed Chinese horseshoe crab into a large plate, sprinkle a layer of refined salt, and place it in a steamer.

3. After the water boils, steam for 15 minutes and it is ready.

2. Stir-fried horseshoe crab meat

Main ingredient: 1 Chinese horseshoe crab

Auxiliary ingredients: an appropriate amount of oil, an appropriate amount of spicy fresh dew, an appropriate amount of monosodium glutamate, an appropriate amount of ginger, an appropriate amount of onion, an appropriate amount of garlic, an appropriate amount of red chili, an appropriate amount of light soy sauce

Steps:

1. Buy a fresh, live horseshoe crab at the market.

2. Then cut the horseshoe crab open, take out the meat, and discard the shell.

3. Wash the removed meat clean.

4. Put the horseshoe crab on a cutting board and use a knife to chop it into small pieces, not too small.

5. Then cut some auxiliary ingredients: ginger slices, onion slices, garlic, red chili.

6. Clean the wok, add some raw oil, fry the ginger slices until a bit dry, and add the horseshoe crab meat.

7. Stir-fry the horseshoe crab meat until a bit dry, add the onion slices, and stir-fry again.

8. Pour the garlic and red chili into the wok, stir-fry briefly, add monosodium glutamate (an appropriate amount), stir-fry again, add spicy fresh dew (an appropriate amount), and toss a few more times. Take it off the heat.