Getting Ready to Eat –Filleting Fish
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| Filleting fish is a clean method of preparing fish for cooking and eating. There are a number of different approaches to this task but the one that I describe here, to me, is the easiest and the simplest method and works well for any species of fish. I believe that filleting fish is a learned skill and the more that you do it, the better you get at it. Don't be afraid to make mistakes because you will learn from them. When I first started, it was a mess. I wasted some good meat which upset me but with practice, I have gotten better at it. I still have to pay attention to what I am doing. A really important key to being successful at this task is to have a very sharp filleting knife. This is especially true if you are working with a fish like walleye that has a tough skin. | |
| For the demonstration below, I used a rainbow because that is what I had available to me at the time of writing this article. The pictures and descriptions are in sequence as I prepared this fish for the frying pan. Where relevant, I have tried to provide a view of both sides of the fish as I prepared the fillets. | |
1.
| Open up the belly cavity. You do not have to remove the innards. |
| 2.
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Cut through to the backbone just behind the gill plate. | |
| 3.
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| Run your knife along the backbone and remove each side of the fish. | |
| 4.
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| Sides removed and the skeletal remnant. I removed the innards from the picture to illustrate how completely you can remove the fillet. | |
| 5. (a)
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| 5. (b)
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Remove the rib cage from each fillet. | |
| 6.
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Rib cage removed. | |
| 7.
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Remove any fatty tissue. | |
| 8. (a)
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(b)
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| (c)
| (d)
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| Remove the skin. Move the knife blade back and forth in a sawing motion as you move it forward. | |
| 9.
| Remove the blood vein (zipper) described in tip #2. |
| REMEMBER 3 KEY POINTS:
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OOPS! Got to go now. Supper's ready. We are having rainbow!
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