A POD a few days back had me scratching my head a bit.  It was a sight that I have not witnessed in Quetico and that being a SM bass on a stringer.  I assume it was on the stringer for the purpose of carving it up and eating it but I could be wrong.  Regardless, this led me to question my menu in Quetico.  I've never considered bass as table fare when I can have my fill of Walleye, Pike or LT.  I like to fish for bass and they are a blast to catch but eat . . . ?  What say you and why?

I eat them. I’m not a fish snob.

Sorry the devil made me say it. 
Actually I like a variety.  I even eat a northern if it is a spring trip. 

polarbear wrote on Apr 30^th, 2011 at 11:33pm:


Ummmm, ok.  I'm not a fish snob and I'm not turning my nose up nor am I doubting that it's eatable but just wondering "why" when the lake is full of walleye.  If you like it, fantastic.  I've just never considered the idea.

Nothing quite like the taste of a walleye caught in the Canadian shield.

This might be interesting though..........we much prefer to eat smallmouths than walleye in the Lake St. Clair, St. Clair river and Lake Erie watersheds. It's not that they are bad, the water quality is very good nowadays and has been for quite some time. The "white bellied" walleyes are just a different tasting fish than the "yellow bellied" eyes caught in canoe country.

We like the smallies and find them excellent eating certainly not to be compared with their big mouth counterparts. Of course ANY red meat on any fish I catch is trimmed away.

I am also extremely fond of eating northerns, especially those with a little heft to them. A 30" is generally worth cleaning as the bones are developed enough to be able to NOT cut through them so easily as with the smaller ones. Small pike = hassle in my book. I love the meaty firmness of pike and think they have a good flavor as well.

Well, I am turning my nose up, at the thought of eating a bass.  Yup, I did it once, never again.  Truely for the dogs.  I'd eat my dirty sock first.  Sure they're fun to catch.  But why, when you've got anything else to eat?

I will gladly assume the "fish-snob" moniker.

I aim for a trout, pike or walleye meal daily.  Reminds me of the good ol' boy convention on LLC.  About 4 bass boats trailered over from Sandpoint.  All of 'em from Alabama land.  They were in heaven and couldn't eat enough smallies.  They threw the pike and 'eyes back.  Had me over to their fire at Zup's....now that was a mess o' bass in the frying pan.  I politely declined and went away snickering...(<--fishsnob).

I never much liked bass when I would sometimes have it summers on Lake Simcoe as a kid.  So I was surprised how much I liked it when we cooked some up this past summer in Quetico.  In fact, my wife prefers it to Walleye.  I can't say that I prefer it but it is very light.  I remember bass as having a very "fishy" taste but last summer I became a convert.  Maybe it has to do with the northern lakes.  I'm sorry there won't be any bass where I'm going this summer, not only because they are exciting fish to catch but because of the taste.

When I moved to Minnesota over 20 years ago, a wise guy told me that Minnesotans like their fish white and tasteless (bland?).  So their fish of choice for eating are walleye and crappie. 

Over the years I've found this stereotype to be true!

prouboy

Quote:


+1

I think I've filleted 5 smallies in the past 15 years or so and 4 of them were at the specific request of others in my party.  I can only recall one meal where we had to fillet a smallie to round out the meal.

I like fish on canoe trips about every 3rd day.  When solo, a couple of 12 inch smallies fried up with some rice and vegies can really hit the spot.  I'll eat any specie, preferring small lakers, walleye and smallies.  Pike are tasty, but a pain to fillet and slimy as heck...

SM and NP were regular dinner fare before I learned how to catch walleyes.  Bass survive well enough on a stringer, so I don't hesitate to hold a couple while trying to draw a walleye.  And then there's the kids.  Its a real bummer to them to have their "trophy bass" tossed back because its the wrong species.

-YB

JChief wrote on May 2^nd, 2011 at 12:30am:


Like KF, we consider smallmouth the fish of choice for our weekly Cache Lake Fish Chowder dinner (or lunch). Many years ago on a late fall trip we hoped to hang a walleye for dinner while traveling to our next camp. Unfortunately, the weather and fish did not cooperate and we arrived at camp fishless. Determined to have fish for the chowder, I worked the shoreline around camp and caught a decent little smallmouth which we promptly chunked up and added to the soup. From then on it's been a staple.
Fried walleye, baked laker, fried (very good) or "Poor Man's Lobster" for the northerns and smallmouth for the soup........standard weekly fare.

The first time I tried smallie for dinner was a few years ago on a trip with my two 20 yr old sons and one of their friends. He was a big fella, not heavy, but he had quite an appetite. Needless to say, I had on that particular trip, underestimated our food requirements. The last day of our trip left us with only some crackers and a small bag of dried apricots. I supplemented the last tiny ration with one small Northern, one small walleye and a medium bass. I have to say the bass tasted pretty good, maybe it's because we were on the brink of starvation, or at least our stomachs were telling us so. I would eat it again, but I do prefer walleye or lake trout.

im not a fan of eating bass. ive had them a couple times and was never impressed. if you butterfly them so they are thinner and take more batter they taste alright.

baked lemon pepper lake trout #1
battered and fried walleye #2

Smallies in the Spring from those cold Northern waters are just fine in book.

I have thought about the whole eating bass thing for awhile now including largemouths and have come to this conclusion.

I personally think what makes a fish taste good or bad is its primary diet and not water temps. Catch a laker out of lake michigan where it's primary diet is very oily baitfish and they taste pretty bad in my book.........like inedible bad with rolls of oily fat on them. When I kept hearing about how good the lake trout were in canoe country I had a tough time believing it.

Some of the best fish I have eaten were largemouths and they came out of strip mines. Now some may say pure clean water and there may be some truth to that but I think it was because these bass ate nothing but crawdads. Same with smallies. I think smallies are so good because they have an affinity with crayfish. Can't prove it but I strongly suspect it is true. Some of the best eating saltwater fish also prey heavily on shellfish. Hogfish and mutton snapper come to mind.

Right you are! Shellfish are a cleansing agent in any ecosystem. That is one reason I'm not always crazy about eating oysters, shrimp and the like. Must be some reason they aren't kosher. So if the crayfish eat up the pollution and the bass eat the crayfish ............

solotripper wrote on May 2^nd, 2011 at 10:45pm:

I think you have this backwards, but agree with what I think you're saying.  The low end is closest to the source, herbivoires & photosynthesizers & such.  The top end is where we tend to eat & where concentrations are highest.

Little fish pick up & store little quantities of pollution.  They don't live very long so they don't have the chance to build up large quantities.  Big fish live for decades & subsist on the little fish.  Pollution has a chance to build up.

We need to eat further down the chain.  Leave tuna & salmon & swordfish alone.  For our own health and the health of the world.  Ironic that our move to eat up the food chain resulted in our ability to critically examine the results of eating up the food chain.

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Preacher wrote on May 3^rd, 2011 at 2:04pm:


I hate to get into a religious discussion on this thread but just remind your "pal" that when the orignal idea of kosher was created, there wasn't "rule makers" but only one "Rule Maker". And I'm sure He had all the knowledge of metabolism. I'll leave my comments at that.

A bit late joining this one but I would prefer eating my shoes versus LT. SM are great from clean water. Like any of the fish don't lkeep the big ones eat the smaller fish. 

We like to mix up the meals so Walleye are first then Pike and Bass  but we very our menu, helps the pallet enjoy the flavor variations of good fish.

It amazes me how many people eat LT in MI most of us consider them a nusaunce fish like CARP!  Actually I think Carp Would Taste Better 

My basic rule for eating what I catch is how it tastes without any seasonings or sauces.

Puckster wrote on May 3^rd, 2011 at 1:51am:


Similar experience on a canda trip out side of the Q. Caught 2 whitefish which to my then uneducated eye looked like a cross between a shad and a carp and promptly released them. When I got back to the dock I saw a canadian couple with a few of the shad/carp on a stringer so I had to ask. In their opinion, whitefish was the only fish to keep for eating purposes. I still haven't tried it other than smoked but live and learn. Or is it learn and live?

J

JChief wrote on May 3^rd, 2011 at 8:34pm:

Did a trip into the White Otter one year, when a old paddling companion was recovering from a serious closed head injury. Stayed in Cabin run by Canoe Canada, on little lake off of White Otter. Stroll thru woods put us in WO with boat and motor.

One of the guys reeled in a Whitefish, much to my surprise. He didn't know what it was and almost let it go. I recognized it and we got onto a school and caught a few more.

They were spectacular grilled in foil with onions and Cajun Blackened Fish seasonings

Seasonings/Sauces/Marinades IF done right add to the flavor of fish, not take away. If all you taste is the seasoning you might as well get a piece of freezer burned cod and chew on that

im not a big fan of the taste of unskinned pike either. i always skin it and to deal with the bones you cut it into fish sticks. take the fillet with the skin on it and then cut it like a piano keyboard, about 1/2 inch wide keys. then move the skin and the bones will fry right out. this method works with pike up to 25 or so inches. beyond that, the Y bones are too thick and dont dissolve in the grease. i wouldnt eat a pike over that size anyway.

Westwood wrote on May 4^th, 2011 at 3:44am:

Westwood,
Really? Invasive? Maybe nonnative. If they were invasive would the Minnesota DNR make the end of the SM season catch and release if they were an invasive species? I think we are beyond invasive and into non native game fish.
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I'm pretty close to agreeing with PJ here on pike flavor.  I wouldn't call it nearly identical to walleye but it is a close second in my book.  My strong preference to stringer up walleye over pike is more due to the bones than flavor. 

The bones are not a huge nuisance...if you know how to attack the fillet with your fork you can strip 'em 100% out very easily...but hey, I'm lazy and walleye ARE easier to eat and to fillet.

wally wrote on May 4^th, 2011 at 7:49am:


Out of Quetico, yes, well almost.  I find little difference the times I have carved one up.

Out of the 6th Crow Wing, I probably wouldn't eat it.

Quote:

:exclamation
Oh you poor misguided child. 

Quote:

Agree.  I've had cold water lakers (not Great Lakes) that taste bleh when compared to other species.

wally wrote on May 4^th, 2011 at 12:44pm:


We need a 'sarcasm' emoticon around here.  That Crow Wing chain is nothing but sewage and boat exhaust.

Westwood wrote on May 6^th, 2011 at 2:38am:


Westwood,
I remember hearing stories of our canoe camping fore fathers transplanting SM into lakes where they were not native. So maybe they are native to the mississippi basin but not to the arrowhead regoin. I guess I assumed you were talking about the BWCA. Either way I would say there is a huge difference between non native and invasive. Milfoil=invasive....Ring neck Pheasant=non native  

So now I understand.  Non-native are creatures/plants we like and invasive are creatures/plants we don't like.  So friendly Martians are non-native and destroy the Earth Martians are invasive.
Westwood

I encountered a group of Eye snobs in Ely a few years back who told me I was lower than a swamp creature for eating bass.  Had never heard that before.  I guess there was some concern about the fact that bass like to eat crawdads that was particularly repulsive to these gentlemen.

Setting the Northerns aside, we choose table fare based on availability and size as much as anything.

Often times the lakers are too big, but they eat good.  Any of the big three (again, not the N Pike, imho) in the 17 to 18 in is going to taste good if cooked well.

On the other hand, we eat n. pike only if necessary, and if someone volunteers to hone their fish cleaning skills.

*** This poll has now closed *** Alrighty then but that was like 75 views and 1 vote ago. 

PhantomJug wrote on Aug 11^th, 2012 at 12:26am:

I agree but they still taste good!
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With fish you are not talking continents, but watersheds.  Quetico has two watersheds.  One is Hudson Bay (Arctic Ocean) and the other is Lake Superior.  My understanding is that bass are native to the Lake Superior watershed, but not the Arctic watershed.

Jon wrote on Aug 12^th, 2012 at 12:57am:

Ya know, now that I think about it, I believe I'd prefer a BW/Q bass to a local walleye. Northerns taste way different 'round here than up there too. Best fish I ever had was a monster Quetico Bluegill. It's the only one I ever caught up there and was big enough to make cleaning one worthwhile. Just thinking about it makes my mouth water.

PJ
I did the same test several years ago with a crew of adults and kids.  It was early in the year and the water was cold. I had walleye, bass and northern. The northern was a couple of small ones and northern out of cold water taste better. All species did about the same.

I'll clean and eat Smallies, but prefer Pike or Walleye (and in that order). I am such a compulsive Smallmouth fisherman that over the years I have developed a chronic Smallmouth "twitch" in my retrieve