Crappie and Shrimp fry with WOK debut

[walle]

Afternoon!
Digging through the freezer yesterday and came across a jackpot - Crappie and shrimp. Made me hungry, so that's what we had for a late lunch today. I don't think I've ever shown off my Wok, so figured this would be a good time to do that as well. I know a lot of you have them (Woks), but maybe you'll get some ideas on some of the add-on's that I've built that help get the job done a little easier.

Here's what we're up against.


I like to use a beer batter, starting with a stong, hoppy beer. Using a local micro-brew which is damn tasty to drink as well.
I soak the fish and shrimp in beer for maybe five minutes, then grab a handfull, let it drain, and into a Bisquick dry batter. I use straight Bisquick, and just season it up to my liking. Here's what I used today:


Here's my Wok -


Great thing about Wok's, they are shallow and don't use a lot of oil. I'm guessing I've got less than a quart in it today.
Here it is with the first batch and the Add-on's, my shelf/coffee/crab boil rack (left), and my fish fry basket (right).


First batch of of crappie and shrimp.


I love the rack, just heated and bent a 1/2" piece of angle to fit the lip, used separated iron for the rack, and have added a back stop.


Dumping a load

Batch of shrimp


Today's final take


Close up of shelf/coffee/crab boil rack. Just have to swing the leg to put the burner under it.


And here's my late lunch!


Thanks for checking out my post. Hope I made you hungry for fish, and gave some good mod ideas for your Wok.
Tracey

 

[yount]

awesome thanks now i need to get me one of them woks.lol where does one get a wok like that

 

[meat hunter]

Crappie huh? Well first let me start of by saying how much I hate you right now. You know how long it's been since I caught any crappie? Ones that actually had some meat on em? Here in MN when I was a kid, I'd catch em all the time. Not so much anymore.
Ok, maybe I don't hate you, I think it's just jealousy LOL.

What a great spread you put on there. I love that wok. Where did you get that? Did you make it?

Being from MN, and cooking up a fish that is my all time favorite, and for putting out some great eats with great pics, I give you

Good job....

 

[walle]

I actually built this one from scratch using a 24" John Deer disc and a burner from an old resturant stove my dad had.

I've seen some fairly decent woks at different sporting good stores. If you don't have the tools or inclination to build it, I would buy a wok and use a turkey fryer burner.

They are awesome cookers. I can break this one down and take it everywhere.

Thanks for the points, Yount.
Tracey

 

[gofish]

Very nice set up. I would love to know more about the wok .... nice shelf, the back stop looks like it realy helps to easily unload the goods. Cant wait to see a stir fry.

Oh, ... the grub looks good too!

 

[walle]

Thanks, Meat Hunter! Crappie are one of my favorites too. One of the best all around fish in my book. Might trade them straight across for Halibut... but only if I could fish for the Halibut!

Thanks, Gofish!

Re: the Wok - like I said below, I used a 24" JD implement disk. I welded 1" couplers to the bottom so that I could screw/unscrew the legs for transport. I just mounted the burner cradle (actual burner just sits in the cradle) to one leg. I used it for a while, then thought - damn! that would make a pot of coffee lickity split, so I build the shelf/rack. We do a lot of crawdadding in the summer, so it also serves as my crab (crawdad) boil burner. I just use my turkey fryer pot, and it it will have that at a rolling boil in less than 10 minutes... that's pretty quick for that much cold water.

From there, just like most things, I build the fish fry rack, then added the back stop to it so that I got at least as much fish as the dog!

Both of these mod's just use a simple bird mouth type grove to sit on/wedge against the lip for easy on, easy off.

Thanks guys - your comments and points are appreciated.
Tracey

 

[cajunsmoke13]

Ok, that is freaking awesome. Man, love me a fish/shrimp fry. Geez, that looks good.

 

[walle]

Thank you very much, Cajunsmoke!

 

[rbranstner]

I would like to have one of those.

 

[shlongstar]

Holy cow, that is the most badass Wok I could possibly imagine. haha.

 

[thunderdome]

Fantastic post, wok, and lunch

Is that a disk blade for the wok?

 

[walle]

Thanks, ThunderD!
Yep, that's exactly what it WAS!

Thanks Shlongstar!

 

[chefrob]

great wok! i like the space yo have to work with.....any mods to the burner to convert NG to LP? great grub also.......

 

[donnylove]

Man that's some tasty lookin' stuff. Points for you on the wok and the chow!

 

[bbq engineer]

Man...That is a sweet looking setup, not to mention the grub! Love that wok idea. That is just awesome.

I get so many great ideas from this place...sometimes I just walk away shaking my head wondering why I didn't think of that, and this post is one of those moments...

I will also try the beer / seasoned bisquick batter. It looked awesome.

 

[bassman]

Outstanding meal, Tracey! I'd like to know where you got the crappie (other than "they were in the freezer).

 

[ciolli]

That wok setup is badass. I couldn't agree more with BBQ Engineer, some of the things you guys think of are incredible. That is incredible....

 

[mballi3011]

Now that is quite the set up you have there for the fish fry. I just wish I would have found my invite before you finished fring. But it all looks great and I bet it was delish.

 

[treegje]

Man those look good ,certainly earned points

 

[walle]

Geez, guys - now you have me blushing

!

Chefrob - no mod's to the burner itself, that's handled by the size of the orfice. Small for NG, larger for LP. I stopped trying to buy orfice's. I just make my own. You can use either a pipe cap (1/8") is plenty big, then start with a very small drill bit and see how it burns, OR use a hose barb, solder it shut, and drill it out. The burner itself does have some O2 adjustment.

THANKS, Donny....I'm feeling Da-LOVE

Thanks, BBQ E.! Coming from you, that means a lot! (whole Iron Maiden smoker thingy

you just scrapped together)

Sorry Bassman, how remiss of me. Got them in that lake over there that way, by that big mountain. Good catch

Thanks, Ciolli!

Sorry Mballi! I barely got any and I live here!! You wouldn't have had a chance.

Thanks for all of the compliments, guys.
Tracey