While we are on the subject of catfish cooking, here's pic of my dinner last night, you guessed it, catfish and more catfish, there are a gazillion ways to cook catfish in Asia and none of them involved the word "fillet" or "deep fry". Thanks to my diligent wife, she has collected quite a few recipes from Asia.

sun dried salt&sugar catfish (oven cooked) , and roasted rice vegetable and catfish stew, mmm...

Nice! Would you share the recipe of the sun dried salt&sugar catfish (oven cooked)? Thanks!

LMAO!

What you see is what you get right here, wholesome, natural, as close to food source as possible! No rBGH, steroid, antibiotics, CO2 (to make red meat red), loads of salt sugar chemical preservatives,etc. none of those (censored)!

LOL! the ingredients are salt and sugar (just a little of each), let fish marinate in fridge for 5-6 hours,.. brush some veg. oil on the fish before placing them on mesh screen trays (we use plastic trays bought from Asian supermarket). Sun drying for 2 days. bake in oven or on charcoal open fire outdoor for a few minutes until meat turn golden brown... Enjoy!

How to prepare fish: apply lots of salt on catfish skin, scrape the slime off the skin, cut head off, remove guts, wash thoroughly, open filet fish from back cut to rib cage, push knife through the contour of rib bones, flip fish over and do the same on the other side. Remove the center bone, you have one whole piece of catfish meat, make 3 cuts to divide meat into 4 strips but remain connected as shown in pic above, then final wash with running water.

That looks good Ren! I gotta try that with catfish I bet you it was good because that's how I cook my hybrids when my family friends are in town.

It is good! similar in taste with dried hybrids, but catfish has better texture after sun dried...at least with the smaller catfish that we used. Try it, and enjoy!

If you were talking about the baked catfish, we bake hybrids a little differently, still you olive oil on the fish while it is in the oven, but we don't add any flavor afterward,...baked hybrids meat has natural sweet flavor already, just wrap them in vegies and same sauce that we used for catfish. mmm...!

Does the fish not spoil out in the sun?

Nope! The salt preserves the fish, the sun dehydrates and further preserves the fish,... after two days in the hot Texas sun, the fish is actually cooked (the same way ole traditional beef jerky are "cooked" in the sun) but with fish we don't eat them like you'd eat beef jerky, we always bake the fish before eating 'em. In fact, after fish are sun dried we can keep them in freezer for a month , and they'd still be relatively "fresh" and taste just as good, mmm...!

Do flys and other critters get on's while its drying or is it in some kind of mesh? Im curious to try this but my question is stopping me.
i read about the trays but it confused me.

some people build meshed screen boxes to put over their trays to keep the flies away, we used to use meshed screens to cover our trays, but got a tip from fellow anglers that if we apply vegetable oil on the fish thoroughly, the flies will stay away. It works! Not sure if the smell of veg. oil or its shining effect on the fish that does the trick, but it works! Just apply vegetable oil on your trays and fish thoroughly, use newspapers to catch those excess dripping oil, you'd see flies might circle your fish then just fly away. We never noticed any critters come near the fish other than the flies.

that looks pretty yummy

Thanks I will try if I catch fish this weekend.

You'd love it! Make sure you check the weather before you marinate your fish, remember you need at least two days of sun shine of 80F+ to sun dry your fish! Enjoy!

You mean to tell me you don't have to fry catfish? Lol