Posted: 7/1/2007 6:18:53 AM EDT
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I'm not sure where to put this because I don't see a fishing forum, so I thought I'd stick this here in the hunting forum. My question is: can you eat small bluegill? I know of a pond that has TONS of bluegill in it. I was told that if I hook any of the smaller bluegill that I should kill it and throw it in the trash if I don't eat it. So, can you eat the smaller bluegill, if so, then how? Thanks. |
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Bluegills can get overcrowded/stunded in smaller ponds.I used to fish a pond where the owner FORBID me from releasing them. We'd either toss them in weeds for the coons, or save them for coon bait come trapping season. Also, a good bluecat bait. Never ate the small ones,as iit seems like a lot of work for a little meat, but never had a bad BG. But fried up in cornmeal or beer batter, with some fried potatoes and scrambled eggs is sounding GOOD! |
You sure can. Clean the fish, put in a bag with seasoned cornmeal, shake the bag to coat the fish, fry in hot oil. Bluegills, [aka bream], are excellent eating, particularly small. |
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Do I need to fillet it or can I just skin it, gut it, and whack it's head off? I'm fairly new to "butchering" fish. My dad always did it for me, so I need to learn this stuff too. I've always practiced catch and release and have only ate 2 fish that I've caught. Edit: Is there a bluegill that is "too small" to cook? If so about what length should I just toss them in the trash? While we're at it, when I pull them out of the pond, should I put them on a string and let them suffocate to death, or kill them with say a bbgun to the brain or hitting the head with a small bat?(suggestions accepted). Any other tips are appreciated, like whats a good bait for bluegill? |
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For bluegill, we never filleted them (they usually weren't big enough to fillet--by the way, if you catch a 1-2 pounder, take it and have it weighed, it's probably a state record!). My grandpa would lay the fish on a cutting board and scrape the scales off with a spoon (start from the tail and work towards the head), cut its head off, and gut it. Rinse it off, batter it in corn meal, salt and pepper, and fry it whole. You can take a pair of skinning pliers (like you use to skin a catfish) and pull the spiny dorsal fin out with those. If the bluegill is smaller than your hand, it's coon food IMO. Eat well! Dusty |
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hell all I ever catch are small bluegill, I just scale, cut the dorsel fin starting tailend first, up to just past where its begins by the head, then down just a bit behind the gills and pull the head off, the ribs, guts etc come right off, and sometimes even the skin if I didn't cut to far down, from there I rinse them, put them in butter milk then coat in seasoned corn meal and deep fry, when done, the meat will pull away from the back bone easily. |
Nothing exotic is needed to clean a bluegill [aka bream]. Fileting is optional, based upon user preferences. Fileting bream from my viewpoint is too much work for results received. If you cook the fish really "done", then the small bones should present less problems when eating. There is no such thing as a "too small" bluegill. The smaller ones cook up great, maybe better than the larger ones. When you pull your stringer out of the water, put the fish on ice in a cooler. When you get them home, scale, gut, cut off the heads and either freeze in water or fry. Very easy to do. No need to kill bluegills with a bat, bbgun, claymore, or tactical thermonuclear device. Just clean, cook and eat. Bait depends on what they're interested in hitting at the time. Crickets sometimes work good, so do red wrigglers [aka red worms]. Generally, bream will hit on red wrigglers if nothing else. Meal worms are good too, as are catalpa worms or grubs. Wasp and bee larvae from their nests are usually good producers. Use small hooks, as you'll get better results. Fly fishermen can give you tips on what to use if you're doing that; I have no idea because I' m not coordinated enough to use a fly fishing outfit and to be able to keep all my body parts unpierced. If you want to have real fun, use an ultralite rod and reel so you can feel all the action. When using an ultralite rig, the smallest bream will feel like a five pound bass. Tremendous fun there. Bream don't hit much when the water is really warm, like in the middle of the hot part of your typical summer day. Early morning from sunrise until whenever they stop hitting is usually the better times to fish for them. |
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When I was a child I used to spend summers witwh my sister's godparents and caught tons of tiny bluegill. 'Aunt' Dot used to clean the little buggers for me and pick all the meat from the bones and mash them into patties and fry them. Tasty from what I remember. Since we're talking pond bream I have a question. In our pond I don't eat anything because I caught a load of bass and bream once and when I cleaned them they had white worm parasites. Loaded with them. Not in the intestinal tract or the meat but in the void inbetween them. Needless to say they went in the trash. Any ideas? |
Are you sure they weren't getting ready to spawn? |
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My grand-dad used to always talk about making chowder or stew with the little ones in a pressure cooker. Like others said, headed, gutted, scaled...then pressure cooked until the bones were soft enough you just ate the whole thing. I never had any and don't know how long that would take in a pressure cooker. |
Heck yea, I use a little ultralight rig with 1.5lb test line. You have to watch your drag close and even the little ones can put up quite a fight. |
I just read an article about stocking your pond that said that a particular kind of snail larvae are sometimes fish parasites. They recommended stocking some Red Ears because they eat that kind of snail and the larvae. |
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Thanks for all the help guys. I went fishing last friday and caught 52 bluegill. Most of them were between 5"-7" long. I cleaned them up and fried them in cornmeal. It was quite a treat. Had to freeze some of them as there were too many for me to eat in a week. All of them had some sort of white parasite inside their body cavity as well as in their guts. I cleaned the stuff out as best I could. The DNR website said they won't harm humans or ruin the flavor if they are cooked above 140 degrees. So I cooked them good. No ill affects 4 days later. Any tips on flavoring to put in with the cornmeal? They could have used flavor/spices, but I'm not a good cook. |
Sounds like you had a great day fishing. For breading the fish, I normally buy fish breader from the store, normally located with the cornmeal. The kind I have in my pantry right now is House-Autry Seafood Breader. I find this kind to be good, although there is a brand that is slipping my mind right now that I like more, but it is hard to find. If I make my own, I usually mix black pepper(a lot of it) and salt into the cornmeal/flour-depending on whatever I have on hand. Also, you can mix stuff like Old Bay Seasoning into the cornmeal(try it on a salad sometime, it is great), or anything like that-creole seasoning, etc. |
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I grew up on bluegill and crappie. We'd go to the lake and catch 50 or 60 of them. Literally fill a couple of 5 gallon buckets with fish. Then we'd set up an assembly line on the tailgate of the pickup. My dad would cut the fillets away from the fish then pass them to me. I'd cut away the ribs, rinse the meat under fresh water and drop it into in a zip lock bag. One freezer bag was about right for a meal and what we didn't eat that night went in the freezer. |
For me Zatarains is the do all spice in the kitchen or camp. But any cajun spice will work good, just add to the flour. You can also just use plain seasoned salt and pepper. If you soak the fish first in a milk or milk/egg mixture add some hot sauce to the milk. Then, ignore these heathens and learn to filet your fish. You can filet even small fish "cat food" sized with a good knife and practice. Ignore the parasites, if the fish are cooked so are the parasites. Sounds like you are on your way. Hmmm? may need to pull a pack from the freezer for tonight. I vac pack all my fish. |
| I like 1/2 plain bread crumbs, 1/2 italian flavored. Then hit with a pinch or two of cayenne pepper, salt, pepper, onion powder and a bit of garlic powder. Dip fish in beaten egg thinned with a bit of milk then bread mix and deep fry or pan fry w/ sufficient oil. Don't over cook them if filleted. They'll be dry and not near as good. |