Grilled janitor fish and fried butete for dinner

More and more Filipino families are going hungry. According to a survey conducted by the Social Weather Stations (SWS) in March, 23.8 percent or an estimated 4.8 million families experienced hunger at least once during the first quarter of 2012. This surpassed the all-time high of 23.7 percent in December 2008. Through the years, there have been numerous media reports about the Filipino urban poor’s fight for survival. In some communities in Tondo, people cook fast food leftovers found in the trash, a dish that has even earned the nickname pagpag. Others resort to eating dangerous and possibly poisonous foods that are abundant and cheap. The “Front Row” documentary “Tawid-Gutom” tells of how two families risk food poisoning just to fill their empty stomachs. Fifty-seven-year-old Ernesto is a fisherman from Cavite. On a good day, he catches enough of fish to feed his family. But when he goes home with empty nets, Ernesto and his family subsist on butete, a local puffer fish that can be fatally poisonous when not prepared properly. Ernesto learned how to prepare butete from his parents. He insists that when prepared correctly, it is actually delicious and safe to eat. Great care must be taken when handling the fish, to make sure the poison doesn’t spread throughout the meat. Sometimes, he doesn’t tell his kids that they are actually eating butete. “Hindi nila alam kapag naluto na, lalo kung binalot namin sa harina bago pinirito. Ang tingin nila hita ng manok, kaya nag-aagawan. Sarap na sarap sa pagkain,” says Ernesto. In Marikina, vegetable vendors Adrian Fernandez and wife Rowena spend their meager earnings on rice and milk for their children. But when their income is not enough, Adrian dives the murky waters of the Marikina River to catch janitor fish, an algae-eating catfish abundant in the river. Janitor fish are not native to the Philippines.  Introduced to the country as an aquarium-cleaning fish, the species has since invaded and multiplied in the Marikina River. Though the janitor fish is not commonly eaten, Adrian insists that the fish is edible: “Ang janitor kasi, kaya sinasabing may lason, kasi sumisipsip ng dumi. Pero ang lamang-loob niyan, malinis.  Kung marunong sila magluto, malalaman nilang walang lason ‘yan.” Adrian grills the janitor fish before removing the tough skin and the innards. He says he learned this method from a friend. The janitor fish may not be the ideal food, but Rowena says it keeps her family from going hungry at night: “Kahit pandirihan nila kami, okay lang naman po sa amin. Basta mabuhay kami. Kaysa mamatay kami sa gutom.”—Alyx Arumpac/PF, GMA News "Front Row" airs every Saturday night at 8:40 PM on GMA News TV 11. Follow the program on Facebook and Twitter for updates about their upcoming documentaries.