Saturday 20 November 2010

Food for thought!

I do pride myself on practicing correct catch & release methods, but I do like to eat fish as well. I spend a lot of time traveling the length of the country teaching out door cooking skills to either fishing guide courses or wilderness guide courses here....especially with pike in mind. As in most countries pike is regarded as a shit fish here and generally gets slaughted and thrown on the bank for mink,eagles & seagulls to finnish off, yet it is a fantastic fish to eat if you know how to fillet it it and especially cook it. Baltic pike taste so much better than river or lake pike purely because of the saline water they live in.

Cut yourself two decent fillets down the length of the spine.

extract the rib bones

Then clear away the irritating Y bones. and your fillet is ready for the next step.

Break an egg into a bowl and mix the whites with the yolk. dip small chunks of pike in the egg then cover with beadcrumbs. Breadcrumbs should have some curry powder mixed into it. take some sour cream,add a decent helping of chives as well as a decent table spoon of sweat chilli,Boil some potatoes and there you have a decent scoff fit for a king. I have so many decent pike recipies on this blog for you to use or visit my good friend Joseph Bognanos blog "Sports fishing Americas" for some truly inspirational table delights using pike.


This is the method I use

cleaning a northern pike from Mark Buesgens on Vimeo.

Here is the Canadian way for filleting pike

6 comments:

Thomas said...

Is the Pike still "alive" on the Canadian way??...
Look at 01:53 mn

the lonesome piker said...

Please don’t put to many of these articles on your blog, Simon. I live in Belgium, where we really have to search for clean waters with pike in it. How delicious they might be, if we start killing them, we won’t have any pike left in no time! Please don’t be offended, by me saying this!

All about the grab said...

Why should I be offended....I eat fish, as most people in Finland.Its my right to be able to put fish on the table. Me placing this post on my blog is my right and shouldn't affect your fish stocks in Belgium.....telling me to not put any more posts like this on my blog is fine....Just don't follow it anymore if it offends you. I teach catch and release around around finland mate......btu If I want to eat fish I will. This blog is full things like this....its my life !

Bruce Deschamps said...

@thomas. if the pike would be alive It would have react right at the beginning.. when the guy starts cutting...

Nice tutorial anyway!

But it is true when you say Simon that Pike is considered as a shit fish. I have always been surprised to hear that as in France we like to eat it. Especially where I am from, near the Loire river, in France. We still have a good population of pikes locally.

Personally, I like to smoke the entire fish and then eat it cold with a little bit of home made mayonnaise... and white wine from the Touraine region... ;P

All about the grab said...

I think bruce th general consensus between none pike fisherman is that they are generally a shit fish....yet are a wicked fish to eat.
You must be the 1st person though that I have heard smoke pike....uuuugh! maybe in a cold smoker but not normally. Great with sherry and cream or mayo and sambel olek chilli past.

Thomas said...

OK Bruce but what is the reaction of the pike that we see at 1:53 mn? A last nervous reaction? Pretty scary...

Please let's don't start here the useless discussion about killing a fish or not. Everyone is free to decide to keep a fish for the table or not.

This blog is doing so much for pike on the fly that it would be a shame to start debating on this subject!