I had a queastion on the best way to clean and eat trout. I have been catching them for the past ten years, but they were always so small I just put them back in the pond. How is the best way to clean one and then cook it??? I an guessing you don't fillet them like crappie or sandies or drop them in the fry daddy.

thanks for any help

If you are catching these from the ponds they stocked them in you are supposed to keep them. I heard people have gotten tickets for releasing them. I used to catch and release them until I heard this. I do not care to eat them but they are fun to catch. Just a heads up.

As far as cleaning them I have always just cut the head off and gut them. Then put them on the grill.

You have to gut em as soon as you catch em to get the best flavor out of em. We used to stuff em with pine nuts and roast em in the coals of the campfire. I have also grilled em. I know a guy that was real good at smacking them on a rock and grabbing the bottom jaw and rippin it off and with that all the guts come out. I could never get it to work right but it makes cleaning them a snap.

I've caught, kept and ate many trout that are stocked in North Texas over the years. Occassionally you can catch some of the larger "brood" size that might weigh 2-4 lbs but typically you catch the 8"-10" variety which are a bit small for filleting. The best way I've found to clean them is by holding them in the palm of your hand with the belly facing up towards you. Take a small pocket knife and cut the the connecting skin between the two gills and make the cut between there and the anal opening (like you would gut most fish). Grab the head of the trout and pull it backwards towards the tail, which will removed the head and all the skin at one time. Wash out the stomach area. The actually cleaning takes about 20 seconds per fish. Season to taste, roll in corn meal and fry to crispy golden brown. I've had many shore lunches when fishing in the waters below Possum Kingdom in years past. All you need is some potatoes, onions, pork n beans and a cold beer to round out an awesome meal.

MAKIN' Me HONGRY!,,,,,,

From everything I have read Allan, the secret is what Buda suggests with the gutting them as so as possible. Never bother freezing a freshwater trout, because their meat begins to break down almost immedietly. Best if cleaned and eaten the day you catch them. I read a book once by Emerson I think it was where he talked about carrying his poaching pan with him, because trout weren't fit to eat unless consumed along the creek bank.

I've always just cleaned them the way David suggests....Takes about thirty seconds or less to head one and then rip him from the anal vent to the throat and wipe out the guts.

Grill and eat kind of like a baked potato with bones.

Scott01 is right on. I lived in Colorado for 12 yrs. and all we did was exactly what he described. We usually left the head and skin on and just pulled out the guts.

Most of the time if you fry them, the rib bones of the smaller 8-10" fish dissolve. The backbone is all that will be left after you devour your trout.

Pick all the meat off the backbone, break the head off and you now have a comb, prehistoric style comb that is.

Back BK, (Before Kids ), my bride and I used to go fishing in Colorado each year in September. We had the rivers pretty much to ourselves since the summertime crowds were gone.

We caught and released a lot of trout, but I did keep some to cook. All I ever did was remove the head and gut them. The skin is fine to leave on the meat.

One of the better ways we found to cook them was to sprinkle some Tony's on them and saute in butter with some onion and garlic. But then I grew up in Louisiana...

Well, I'll tell you that you won't eat for long on a trout you catch in the Athens fish hatchery lake. They taste like mud and they were fried within an hour of catching them.
Kids can take 5 fish and adults have to have a trout stamp to keep any. Two of my grandkids were with me and their catch went right on ice and home to Palestine, quickly cleaned and fried. Terrible!!!! And the worst thing we love the Rainbow we catch in the White River in Arkansas.

Disembowel, behead, wash and drop in a hot butter (real butter)with onions and squeezed lemon. Watch the sun go down on the river.

Sasquatch said it best..."Watch the sun go down on the river".

Joe, Did you scrape out all the blood from inside the top of the cavity? I scrape most of it out with the back of my thumbnail. Some of it will be imbedded between the rib bones. I like to scrape those with a little sharp sliver of rock, or a very small knife blade to break the bones, and then rinse under running water to get every spec of that blood out. Another thing that can affect the taste is the fat strips that runs along each side of the back bone on the very top of the fish.
It's kind of light greyish color, and would be positioned like backstrap is on a deer. Anyway, to get it out, take a sharp filet knife and slice down each side of the dorsal fin to the rib bones. Then, grab the dorsal fin with some pliers, and pull. The fat strip should come peeling off along with the dorsal fin. For some reason, It seems like I'm leaving out some detail in that fat removal step, but can't seem to think what it is. CRS disease I guess.

If that blood sack is left in, it will sure make them taste muddy.

HTH

Jon

I love fly-fishing for trout and have eaten trout cooked many different ways from many different rivers and streams; IMHO I have never eaten one that could compare to catfish or crappie. Trout the size they stock here in Texas are best left as lunker food.

Cordially,

Larry Lynch, Perchsearcher
*************************************************
�Fish is the only food that is considered spoiled
once it smells like what it is.�
~ P. J. O'Rourke

So keep them cold, gut them quick, and fry or grill the same day.
Thanks