Surf & Turf Mountain Man Style.....

[Fueling Around]

Just curious. Have you ever had true southern fried catfish either whole or filets. In the south there are restaurants that only serve fried catfish. I think you would like it. I work in MN from time to time. I absolutely love fried or grilled Walleye. Wish we had it down in the south.

Walleye is the most sought after fish up here. Perch, crappie, panfish, and winter caught pike rank right up there in my taste buds.

Lived on the Ohio river valley of western Kentucky and southern Indiana back in the early 80's.
Tried "fiddlers" pan fried, deep fried, roasted, poached, grilled, and broiled.
Don't what they call them further south, but fiddlers is (was?) the Ohio valley term for catfish. I think all of the local fare was pond raised.

I'm thinking civilsmoker and chopsaw may be on the path to my objection.

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We do eat every catfish we catch though. Love them but there are two preparation things that are a must! First there is a fat vein or tube thing (I don't know what you call it) down the middle of the filet face. This has to be removed. Not removing this will make them taste like rotten dirt! Second the dark meat on the flesh side need to be trimmed away. Removing this fatty meat will cut the strong fish flavor away and leaves a light white fish flavor.
...

That "tube thing" would be the lateral line and the dark meat is equated to a fish kidney. Similar to eating a fresh water drum (sheepshead). Pull the lateral line and trim the dark meat and it is very tasty when breaded and deep fried.

We always let them ( catfish ) swim in clean water for a night , then cleaned as you mentioned .
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Hmm, is that same as putting crayfish in clean water to purge the mud vein?

 

[chopsaw]

Hmm, is that same as putting crayfish in clean water to purge the mud vein?

Yes . 3 or 4 fish in a cooler .

 

[civilsmoker]

Civil,

We found this little lake in 2002 and have been fishing it every year since...initially it was the smallies we were after (75 fish day convinced us we needed to do the 5 hr drive north as often as possible) but we got into a striper boil in warm creek a couple of years later and got hooked (pun intended) on fishing for stripers, especially when boil season came around (at the time 5-7 pounders were the norm). Needless to say we love going up and camping and fishing there. Our best day striper fishing was 147 fish in a day, just me and the wife. In the end we had them so worked up we were catching them on 1/4 ounce jigs with nothing but a bare hook. It was insane, we were laughing so hard we actually hurt. And they were surrounding the boat jumping into the cooler (ok not quite but pretty close).

So I am stoked to go up and spend some quality time with my first mate (wifey) and get in some great smallie (and we use ultra-lite rods an reels for these guys) and striper fishing.

Here is my porterhouse waiting to be cooked on the weber....
View attachment 408472


John

John, the boil is addicting for sure! We get the swarm with crappie and will land a couple hundred a weekend but we limit what we take home cause it’s just too much to eat! Last trip we started just using a hand line and finally just had to quite cause at some point you have to stop!

Nice looking porter! Enjoy!

 

[Fueling Around]

Thanks FA! The wall tent is a beautiful thing pretty much my fav way to camp. The wife still likes the trailer but that's why we do both.
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I was looking for my pictorial comeback. Boy Scout T-shirt that reminds one that "camping is in tents". I have an older truck camper (thank you Smokin' in AZ) that we used to family camp. Wife, daughter, and son slept in the camper. Dad slept in the tent. Worked for me as I'm the last one to bed and first up in the morning and sawed about 10 cord with my snoring. Sure annoyed the neighbors when we stayed in a RV park.

 

[civilsmoker]

FA, if that tube this hasn’t been removed then oh my yuck!

Next time try creating nice clean pure white fish finger size pieces. Then fry these up like any other white fish!

FYI we had lots of crappie here we catch about 500 or so a year but only keep about 150 of the biggest ones. We do the same thing for frying. Nice finger size and beer batter....YUM!

 

[civilsmoker]

FA - My wife has ear plugs for the sawing logs!!!

Oh we always use salt water for crawfish. Makes the poop like crazy!

 

[jcam222]

FA - My wife has ear plugs for the sawing logs!!!

Oh we always use salt water for crawfish. Makes the poop like crazy!

I started snoring so bad about 5 years ago my wife would just get up and go downstairs to the couch when I’d come to bed lol. Finally went and mentioned it to the doc and voila apnea. Haven’t snored once since I got that fancy machine lol

 

[civilsmoker]

I started snoring so bad about 5 years ago my wife would just get up and go downstairs to the couch when I’d. One to bed lol. Finally went and mentioned it to the doc and voila apnea. Haven’t snored once since I got that fancy machine lol

The funny thing is my wife snores as well but it doesn’t bother me... mine is due sinus stuff so not all the time just sometimes.....

With regards to me, I just tell her that it keeps the bears away from camp! LOL!

 

[Fueling Around]

FA - My wife has ear plugs for the sawing logs!!!

Oh we always use salt water for crawfish. Makes the poop like crazy!

I prefer to annoy the neighbors when we camped in a RV park. I have some great stories...

Salt makes crayfish do a lot of things, but fresh water and cornflour keeps them lake or river natural. Salt water dehydrates and eventually kills them.

 

[civilsmoker]

Salt makes crayfish do a lot of things, but fresh water and cornflour keeps them lake or river natural. Salt water dehydrates and eventually kills them.

Once we caught them we were always in a hurry so would salt bath them for only a min or two then fresh rinse then in the vat of crab boil.....

 

[Smokin' in AZ]

John, the boil is addicting for sure! We get the swarm with crappie and will land a couple hundred a weekend but we limit what we take home cause it’s just too much to eat! Last trip we started just using a hand line and finally just had to quite cause at some point you have to stop!

Nice looking porter! Enjoy!

Alamo lake and Roosevelt have tons of crappie, I usually do 1 or 2 trips every year, 2 pounders are average but I also catch a few 3 pounders. Love them almost as much as walleye.....

FA - My wife has ear plugs for the sawing logs!!!

My wife does as well

 

[civilsmoker]

John, those are some pretty big crappie! Those would make a pretty nice beer batter fry!

 

[gmc2003]

Beautiful scenery and excellent cook. Now that's what I call relaxing. Carp around here is considered a garbage fish and is mostly used in gardens. There are a few Asian families that will take them off your hands, but for the most part they wind up in the ground.

Point for sure
Chris

 

[Winterrider]

Lots of carp in the Dakota waters also. Was shore fishing on our local reservoir a few years ago when an older gentleman down the bank from me grabbed a bag out of his cooler and strolled down towards me. We started chit chatting and he asked if I had ever tried smoked carp. I had maybe 30 yrs ago. His was fantastic tasting, not dried out at all. Said he usually smokes about 50# / yr. I wish I could remember his recipe. It was a very simple process but don't recall. I do recall him saying about 8-9 hrs smoking for about a 10# fish.
Garden material otherwise, as it is considered wonton waste to just leave them on shore. Hefty fine from Game&Fish.

 

[Smokin' in AZ]

Lots of carp in the Dakota waters also. Was shore fishing on our local reservoir a few years ago when an older gentleman down the bank from me grabbed a bag out of his cooler and strolled down towards me. We started chit chatting and he asked if I had ever tried smoked carp. I had maybe 30 yrs ago. His was fantastic tasting, not dried out at all. Said he usually smokes about 50# / yr. I wish I could remember his recipe. It was a very simple process but don't recall. I do recall him saying about 8-9 hrs smoking for about a 10# fish.
Garden material otherwise, as it is considered wonton waste to just leave them on shore. Hefty fine from Game&Fish.

I am going to date myself here but it back in the late 60's, it was acceptable to leave them on the bank (and there were a ton of muskrat that would eat them straight away). Nowadays if I did it I would gut them and throw them overboard for nutrients for the lake, but I do not even target them anymore and have not for 50 years...........

John

 

[civilsmoker]

Beautiful scenery and excellent cook. Now that's what I call relaxing. Carp around here is considered a garbage fish and is mostly used in gardens. There are a few Asian families that will take them off your hands, but for the most part they wind up in the ground.

Point for sure
Chris

Thanks Chris and fully agree on a relaxing trip!!! That is vaca all the way!

Lots of carp in the Dakota waters also. Was shore fishing on our local reservoir a few years ago when an older gentleman down the bank from me grabbed a bag out of his cooler and strolled down towards me. We started chit chatting and he asked if I had ever tried smoked carp. I had maybe 30 yrs ago. His was fantastic tasting, not dried out at all. Said he usually smokes about 50# / yr. I wish I could remember his recipe. It was a very simple process but don't recall. I do recall him saying about 8-9 hrs smoking for about a 10# fish.
Garden material otherwise, as it is considered wonton waste to just leave them on shore. Hefty fine from Game&Fish.

WinterR, I’m sure if it was treated right I probably could be pretty good, however, feeding the garden is a good thing in my book!

 

[civilsmoker]

Smokinbarries, thanks for the like! Much appreciated.

 

[Fueling Around]

...
I do recall him saying about 8-9 hrs smoking for about a 10# fish.
Garden material otherwise, as it is considered wonton waste to just leave them on shore. Hefty fine from Game&Fish.

Same wanton waste rule on my side of the Red (River of the North) for rough fish, which is odd because they really don't encourage catch and release either.

That is a long smoke for fish. Did he mention the temperature profile?
8-9 hours in a Big Chief would be too long

 

[civilsmoker]

No wonton on carp here, it is technically considered littering though. F&G says to....eat them, give them to a mink or hog farm, use in garden, or garbage can.....

They can also be used as cut bait for catfish!