Shore Lunches

Mostly, I’m a “catch and release” guy.  But I don’t  buy into what C & R has become; almost a religion among some anglers.  Small stream brookies, small river brown trout and even smallmouth bass, I release.  However, there are times when eating what I catch – I have no guilt about.  Big ‘bows caught in Meaford Harbour, or fish running up from the Great Lakes – I’ll keep a fish once a while for my dinner plate.

As far as cooking my catch, I’m with Declan who writes, “…  barbeque fresh fish with no extras, just as is from the ocean. They keep it simple.”

I remember years ago, while fishing the Wilmot Creek, a tributary of Lake Ontario, with a friend of mine – and we both caught beautiful silver steelhead in the spring – right when the fiddleheads were coming up out of the ground, and at their tastiest.  We built a fire on shore, and after gutting the fish, roasted them along with some fiddleheads over the open fire.

Mmmmm… what a wonderful exquisite lunch that was – with a little bit of Bushmills Single Malt that I had a long as well.

When barbequeuing a big rainbow, steelhead or salmon, I like to cut slits down the flesh, and then put pieces of apple, onion and greenpepper in the slits.  Then, I mix up the remaining apple, onion and greenpepper and stuff the cavity of the fish with that, double wrap in tinfoil, and then cook for about 45 minutes on the bbq at a medium-low temperature.

Hey, I gotta admit – as much as I like to conserve and release most of my fish, I am indeed a meat eater – and eating that which I catch once in a while is something I very much enjoy.  As “The Meatriarchy” would say, “If God  didn’t want me to eat animals, why did he make them out of meat?”