I don't bleed pike because they just slime too much.
I keep them frozen alive or barely alive.
Then once in my garage I clock them on the head with a 1lb sledge hammer.
Good trick for the slime is to pour a jug of vinegar in a 5 gal pail of water, dunk the whole fish in the vinegar water mixture for a few seconds, the slime turns white and you just peel it off with your fingers....no more slime on the cutting board.
I found that bleeding and putting a fish on ice immediately has a dramatic impact on the quality of the meat.
Learned about, and was doing it wrong for years.
No more live well for my harvested fish. If I plan on harvesting - there is a cooler with ice on the boat.
Makes a huge difference in texture (firm), taste and zero smell ...... if everyone would just try it once ............ I'm sure they would all be packing ice.
I see to many guys dragging a pike on stringer in warm summer water for hours on a hot day and then putting it a garbage bag on their way up to fish cleaning station. Makes me ill just thinking about it.
Last year a guy at the cleaning shack squeezed his 2lb jack out of his slimy garbage bag (the pike was soft and colorless) and commented on how "colorful" my pike looked ..... I just chuckled and offered him the same advice.
I cut its main artery on the bottom side between the gills. Let the heart pump all the blood out. Maybe some other people have different or better methods. I know natives remove the gills alot of the time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by baptiste_moose
Exactly. There is a hard bone plate near the front fins. You wanna be infrint of that. If you can't get through your hitting that bone plate. Should cut like butter with a sharp knife. No blood when filleting plus way better meat quality. I let them pump out in live well for 5-10 min then I also put them on ice.
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