Is it safe and beneficial to eat poached and cut fish bones?
I have allergies to many foods such as dairy, nuts etc so having a difficult time getting enough calcium from natural food sources.
I have realised that fish bones are a good source of calcium, perhaps even my only alternative to supplements.
I know that it is not a good idea to frequently eat long fish bones as these may get stuck in the digestive system and cause complications.
I believe an alternative would be to fry or pressure cook the bones and crunch them down.
Assume frying or pressure cooking is not available to me and instead I boil fish bones in water for 5 minutes, cut them with scissors and swallow them with food, would this be digestible and safe to do frequently?
My concerns are:
- as the bones are cooked with water the bones will not be soft and hence indigestable?
- even though the bones may have been cut small they may still have hard sharp edges, could these edges not cause complications in the digestive system e.g. slice/pinch tissue?
Basically I want to know if it is safe(for digestive system) and beneficial(nutritionally) to eat poached and cut fish bones frequently?
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As the doctor in the other answer has clarified, without any study, it's not possible to reliably evaluate the safety of eating bones of large fish. Bones of large fish are not considered edible for humans, so I doubt anyone has done any study about this. Without a study, you can only guess.
A fish bone can get stuck above the epiglottis (case report, ResearchGate) or somewhere else in the throat or esophagus and cause an infection.
Canned sardines, mackerel, salmon and some other small fish often come with (edible) bones.
The safest source of calcium for someone who is allergic to various foods would be hard water. You can search for nutrition facts of various mineral waters and find an appropriate one. One such list is here: Calcium concentration in bottled and mineral waters, PubMed Central.
Medical science doesn't work like that.
Scientists would have to study whether your suggestion is effective and whether it has side effects. Such studies take time and include hundreds of volunteers. Suppose pressure cooking the bones changes the molecular structure of a chemical component and it is likely to produce side effects? Only serious randomized studies can tell you that. There are several safe products you can buy, should you have calcium deficiency. Your doctor can diagnose whether you need calcium supplements or not. Young people rarely get calcium deficiency.
In addition, calcium can be found in many foods, not only in dairy products.
Dairy Foods
Yogurt (1 cup) 350 mg
Milk (1 cup) 300 mg
Cheddar cheese (1 oz.) 204 mg
Ricotta cheese, part skim (1/4 cup) 169 mg
Cottage cheese (1 cup) 150 mg
Nondairy Foods
Whole Grain Total cereal (3/4 cup) 1000 mg
Pink salmon with bones, sardines (3 oz., cooked) 181 mg
Black beans (1 cup) 103 mg
Broccoli (1 cup, cooked) 150 mg
Almonds (1 tbsp.) 50 mg
Soy Products
Soy yogurt with calcium (3/4 cup) 300 mg
Soy milk enriched with calcium (1 cup) 300 mg
Tofu, firm or extra firm (1/4 cup) 250 mg
Soy nuts, roasted/salted (1/2 cup) 103 mg
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