Workers combine soaked golden abalone with bought abalone shells.
After the abalone shell is pasted with snails, it will be sold under the names of "wedding banquet abalone" and "balone shell".
The "medicine" in paper bags the size of woven bags is piled up in the ice room of the factory.
After testing, the main ingredient is borax.
Workers "dispensing medicine" in the ice room.
Workers put the prepared "medicine" into the sink and dilute it with water.
The golden abalone is soaked in the borax solution, and the solution is reddish brown.
A04-A05 version pictures/Screenshots of unannounced visit video
On the left is the golden abalone that has not been soaked in the "medicine liquid", which is yellowish brown.
On the right is the golden abalone soaked in "medicine liquid" for one hour, the color has faded.
The soaked golden abalone will be sold through the online platform.
Undyed sea cucumbers are dark green.
The dyed sea cucumbers turned dark brown.
The fist-sized golden abalone is tender and plump, "rest assured and delicious"; the dark brown sea cucumber is plump and fleshy, "high-end sea cucumber, no need to explain."
This is a Dalian seafood company's introduction to the products it sells in its online store. The golden abalone in the picture looks fresh and golden, and the sea cucumber is fat.
However, behind these glamorous "high-end" seafood, it is suspected of illegally adding poisonous agents.
On the eve of "March 15", the Beijing News reporter who received the report applied for a job in the company as an operator in the workshop.
A reporter from the Beijing News found that most of the sliced abalone and golden abalone produced by the company use wide-mouthed vortex snails produced in Senegal as raw materials. These medicines were sampled by reporters and sent to a third party for inspection, and they all contained toxic borax ingredients that are banned by the state.
In addition, the "high-end sea cucumber" produced by the company has also been dyed and soaked in the actual production process.
Golden abalone after "drug bath":
Bigger, brighter, smoother and more elastic
This company is a comprehensive fishery enterprise integrating breeding, fishing, processing and sales of seafood treasures.
The official website shows that the enterprise park covers a total area of 200,000 square meters, and produces and processes more than 1,000 tons of seafood treasures such as sea cucumbers and golden abalones throughout the year, with an output value of 1 billion yuan.
On February 25, a reporter from the Beijing News applied for the company's production line of golden abalone and sea cucumber. The production line is located on the first and second floors of a building in the park, and is equipped with cooking rooms, sorting rooms, quick-freezing rooms, and ice-making rooms. and other areas.
In the workshop on the first floor of the factory, there are more than a dozen blue plastic tanks about 1 meter long and 80 centimeters high. Hundreds of kilograms of abalone slices in the tanks are being soaked by the staff in water.
The water surface in each tank is covered with white foam.
"With medicine added inside, freshness preservation and bleaching, the snail meat will look better." A staff member said that these sliced seafood are actually snail meat, and they are called abalone slices to the outside world.
The reporter compared and found that after 2 hours of soaking, the abalone slices were more tender and smoother than before, and the color was whiter and brighter, whether it looked or felt.
In this factory, not only abalone slices are soaked in "potion".
Golden abalone is the company's best-selling product. According to the company's online store information, the sales volume of multiple golden abalone products exceeds 100,000 orders, ranking first in the store's best-selling list.
Another staff member told the reporter that the sales of the company's golden abalone ranks among the top in the same industry in China.
Golden abalone is abundant in North Africa. It is actually a kind of conch. Because it looks like abalone, it is called golden abalone in China.
The incoming package shows that this is a seafood called "wide-mouth vortex" and its origin is Senegal.
The reporter observed that after entering the workshop, the golden abalone first needs to be put into the water tank to thaw with clean water.
The golden abalones of different sizes are yellowish brown after thawing, and the water quality in the tank is clear and has no peculiar smell.
And when the staff put the white "medicine powder" into the sink and dilute it with water, they will put the thawed golden abalone into the sink. With constant stirring, the clear water gradually turns red, and the golden abalone really becomes golden. stand up.
On February 27, according to the arrangement of the workshop, the reporter took two or three thousand catties of golden abalone after thawing and soaked them in the sink mixed with a fixed amount of "powder".
The staff responsible for "prescribing the medicine" told reporters that the golden abalone needs to be soaked in the medicine for 2 days before entering the subsequent process.
It can be seen from the comparison that the soaked golden abalone is not only bigger in size, but also yellower and brighter in color, smooth, tender and elastic to the touch.
What is this magical "powder"?
In the face of reporters' inquiries, many staff members remained silent.
Even the staff who weighed and dispensed the medicine every day said they "don't know."
Mysterious "powder":
Containing borax is banned as a food additive
The reporter saw that in the processing areas on the first and second floors of the company, most of the workshops and corridors are equipped with monitoring equipment.
However, there is no camera installed in the ice-making room where the "medicine powder" is configured, and it is prepared by specialized staff.
Whenever a batch of golden abalone is thawed, the workers who configure the "medicine powder" will enter the ice-making room, and pour it on the electronic scale from the kraft paper bag the size of a woven bag placed against the wall, like digging flour Weigh and adjust in the plastic box on the table, and then send it to the operation room and pour it into the sink to flush with water to dissolve.
"Golden abalone and abalone slices should be soaked in this medicine, mainly for antisepsis, deodorization, and anti-corruption." The dispensing staff said.
What exactly is the medicine?
The reporter saw that the outer kraft paper bags and the inner plastic bags containing the "medicine powder" were not marked with any information about the product. The only thing that could be distinguished was the handwritten letters "G" and "B" on the paper bags. .
In order to find out the composition of the "powder", a reporter from the Beijing News took samples of the two powders in the workshop and sent them to a chemical laboratory in Changchun City, Jilin Province for XRD phase analysis and testing. The test results showed that the main components in the "G" sample Both were borax, and the "B" sample also contained borax.
The "Food Safety Law" stipulates that borax is a poisonous and harmful substance, and it is a preservative that is prohibited from being added to food.
As early as 2008, the National Health and Medical Commission (formerly the Ministry of Health) issued the "List of Non-edible Substances and Food Additives That May Be Added Illegally in Food and Abuseable Food Additives", and listed additives such as borax and Sudan Red in the first batch of banned, list to use.
However, it is this additive that is harmful to the human body and banned by the state. Four or five bags were used on February 27 alone, roughly estimated to weigh 200 kilograms.
When these golden abalones soaked in borax for 2 days appeared in the company's online store, they were stamped with the words "rest assured and delicious".
"The motivation of enterprises is to pursue more economic interests." Zhong Kai, director of Kexin Food and Health Information Exchange Center, analyzed that the use of borax by enterprises in food processing is an illegal addition. Borax can not only play a role in antiseptic and preservation , It can also change the protein structure of the food, increase the draft capacity of the protein, let the food absorb more water, and achieve the purpose of gaining weight.
Fu Jian, director of Henan Zejin Law Firm, said that according to the "Criminal Law", anyone who mixes toxic or harmful non-food ingredients into the food produced or sold, or sells food that is known to be mixed with toxic or harmful non-food ingredients , shall be sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not more than five years and a fine; if it causes serious harm to human health or has other serious circumstances, it shall be sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not less than five years but not more than ten years and a fine; at the same time, according to the provisions of the "Food Safety Law", Those who are sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment or higher for food safety crimes shall not be engaged in food production and operation management for life, nor shall they serve as food safety management personnel of food production and operation enterprises.
Dyed sea cucumber:
Cooking and dyeing deepen the color and become "high-end"
During the undercover investigation, the reporter was transferred to the sea cucumber production line.
In the sea cucumber cooking room, baskets of blue-colored sea cucumbers eventually turned dark brown after cooking.
In the company's online store, these dark brown sea cucumbers are called "wild" and "high-end sea cucumbers".
The staff in the cooking room told the reporter that the color of sea cucumbers turns dark after being boiled, not because they are cooked, but because there are substances that can be dyed in the pot. Cooking is actually the process of dyeing.
After steaming, soaking and other processes, it is then frozen and packaged.
The reporter asked a number of workers in the cooking room, and they all expressed that they were not sure what substance was used to color the sea cucumbers, and only called "black things similar to tea leaves".
A seafood practitioner said that to dye sea cucumbers, tea leaves, ferrous sulfate and sea cucumbers are usually boiled together, and the appearance of sea cucumbers will look better after the color is darkened.
In addition to using banned additives to soak seafood, the company's health management system for employees is not strict.
When the reporter applied for the company, he asked whether he could take up the job without a health certificate.
The recruiter said that they could go to work first, and then arrange relevant medical examinations later, but within 5 days from the reporter's entry to the departure, no one arranged for the reporter to go for the physical examination, and no one asked whether the reporter had obtained a health certificate.
On the third day of employment, the reporter signed a labor contract.
my country's "Food Safety Law" stipulates that food producers and operators shall establish and implement a health management system for employees.
Food producers and dealers who arrange personnel without health certificates to work in contact with directly imported food shall be ordered to make corrections and given warnings by the food safety supervision and management department of the people's government at or above the county level; fine; if the circumstances are serious, the company shall be ordered to suspend production and business operations, or even have its license revoked.
Beijing News reporter Bai Dezhang Yuan Jingwei Wang Kunpeng Cheng Yalong