Researchers hope to make reputation of carp -- er, Kentucky tuna -- a little tastier

In January, we reported on a Louisiana effort to market invasive Asian carp as "silverfin"  and to sell the fish as food. Now a group of Kentucky researchers are attempting a similar project. A group of Kentucky State University researchers think the fish haven't caught on as food because of the reputation associated with bottom-feeding carp, so they are calling them "Kentucky tuna," reports Katheran Wasson of The State Journal in Frankfort.

"The whole point is to allow commercial fishermen to make enough money catching and selling carp so it becomes a viable industry," Sid Dasgupta, associate professor and principal investigator in the KSU Division of Aquaculture and Environmental Sciences, told Wasson. New Orleans chefs working on possible recipes describe the fish as tasting like a cross between scallops and crabmeat. The researchers are still looking for funding, but if they get their way, a grant could "pay for supplies, surveys, marketing analyses and collaboration with fishermen, restaurants, grocery stores and fish markets," Wasson writes. (Read more)