Lake-to-table fish tacos!

Hi all. I got the privilege to join a buddy to camp/fish on a unique lake in the Otter Tail area. A very small public lake with no public access. The lake gets next to no fishing pressure. Only 2 property owners on the lake with the rest of the shoreline being conservation easement. Mostly fished out of my yak and we had our supper on the stringer by 10am the first day. It’s the most consistent and highest quality panfish fishing I’ve ever experienced (great bass and a few pike, too!).

ANYWAY-knowing we’d be eating fish several times, I wanted to make sure we had some variety. So I planned and premade the spice mixing, toppings and chili-lime cream sauce. I can’t take credit for the recipe, but search “fish tacos Natasha’s kitchen” in Google and follow it to a tee. I only modified it by pan-frying the fish in a mixture of butter and olive oil rather than baking it as the camp stove top is all we had. Turned out PERFECT! Can’t beat fish that fresh! Hope I can go back to this place again. What a great time.

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It won’t let me attach two photos to the original post for some reason. But here’s the spread!

Try this recipe yourself! You wont regret it!!

https://natashaskitchen.com/fish-tacos-recipe/

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Taco’s is the best thing for crappies. It helps cover up their shitty taste.
We fried about that exact same mix of fish yesterday and were calling the crappies mud puppies.
Dont tell Crossin-Eyes I said that or he wont let me fish in his lake any more.
My wife and I were fighting over the Gills! lol
Nice looking stringer! Good pic.

suzuki wrote:

Taco’s is the best thing for crappies. It helps cover up their shitty taste.

Ya. Crappies out of some summer water is really hit or miss on the flavor. I have friends who will not eat them out of anything other than frozen lakes in the winter. Once you get a bad mushy one, its hard to get that taste and thought out of your brain. I will say bleeding them and getting them on ice right away till you can clean them makes a huge difference. I bleed and ice almost all the fish I keep to eat these days. You will not believe the color difference in the fillets and the firmness difference it makes.

I’m fairly new to eating Fish Taco’s but have become a big fan of them. A good slaw and cream sauce is the key.

No off-taste with these. Ate a few seasoned fillets on their own and they were awesome. I’ve tried several online recipes, this one by far is my favorite. I think the chili-lime cream sauce is the clincher.

suzuki wrote:

Taco’s is the best thing for crappies. It helps cover up their shitty taste.
We fried about that exact same mix of fish yesterday and were calling the crappies mud puppies.
Dont tell Crossin-Eyes I said that or he wont let me fish in his lake any more.
My wife and I were fighting over the Gills! lol
Nice looking stringer! Good pic.

Try soaking the filets in Franks Red Hot sauce. It helps firm up the filets and takes out the fishy taste.

Soaking them in a little milk can also help….I usually do that with any fish I catch in the summer months.

I notice the fishy taste with any of the larger fish of a species…smaller usually don’t tend to have that taste. When doing fish tacos I usually try and keep some smaller crappies…the 8 and 9″ fish are perfect for taco’s but a little bit of a pain to filet.

That’s a good looking stringer….also have to try that recipe.

fishthumper wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>suzuki wrote:</div>
Taco’s is the best thing for crappies. It helps cover up their shitty taste.

Ya. <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>Crappies out of some summer water is really hit or miss on the flavor. I have friends who will not eat them out of anything other than frozen lakes in the winter. Once you get a bad mushy one, its hard to get that taste and thought out of your brain. I will say bleeding them and getting them on ice right away till you can clean them makes a huge difference. I bleed and ice almost all the fish I keep to eat these days. You will not believe the color difference in the fillets and the firmness difference it makes.

X2

I bleed and ice everything I keep. If you do it this way your filets will be snow white and firm. Another advantage is very little mess when cleaning and very little blood if any on your cleaning surface.

I started bleeding eyes a couple years back and do it every time but haven’t transitioned that procedure to panfish yet because I don’t have a problem with gills or perch and I usually clean them right from the lake with no ice BUT I need to try this on crappies. Thanks for the reminder.

We rinsed the fillets in lake water initially and then gave them a final soak in melt water from our coolers with some ice cubes mixed in. This makes the flesh contract and curl and any remaining blood gets squeezed out. Then into fresh water with some ice cubes in a zip-lock and into the cooler they go. Beautiful pearly white fillets!

mxskeeter wrote:

X2

I bleed and ice everything I keep. If you do it this way your filets will be snow white and firm. Another advantage is very little mess when cleaning and very little blood if any on your cleaning surface.

Yes the lack of blood getting ever where when cleaning is also a added bonus. I have less mess on the fillet board after 10 fish than I do after 1 that is not bleed.

I’m shocked to hear people have had off tastes with pannies.

IMO they are delicious 365 days out of the year.

suzuki wrote:

I started bleeding eyes a couple years back and do it every time but haven’t transitioned that procedure to <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>panfish yet because I don’t have a problem with gills or perch and I usually clean them right from the lake with no ice BUT I need to try this on crappies. Thanks for the reminder.

Crappies is the #1 fish I would bleed. Those things bleed like crazy when cleaning. Bass is another one that is important to bleed. Yes !!! I do keep bass several times a year. They are delicious out off cooler water and when bleed and put on ice as soon as possible.

Deuces wrote:

I’m shocked to hear people have had off tastes with pannies.

IMO they are delicious 365 days out of the year.

yeppers.

Crappies get mushy for me especially when dealing with warm weather. I also ice and bleed fish but crappies are still mushy. I generally just don’t keep crappies anymore and eat bluegills and perch instead.

Excellent fish tacos. Had them 2 nights in a row. 1st night. grocery store had parsley mismarked as cilantro. Got cilantro for the second night. The white corn shells were worth the search. Lighter taste didn’t overpower other flavors. New favorite. Fixens will be on our next houseboat trip. Thanks for sharing.

Adam Steffes wrote:

Crappies get mushy for me especially when dealing with warm weather. I also ice and bleed fish but <em class=”ido-tag-em”>crappies are still mushy. I generally just don’t keep crappies anymore and eat bluegills and <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>perch instead.

I guess I’m just baffled by this. I’ve never had a mushy crappie? Or a bad tasting panfish.

I talk about this a lot with my clients. I think it’s very important to keep fish alive and cool obviously but when it comes time to clean panfish in the summer they are absolutely loaded on the inside with poo. Being they eat way more in the summer than they do in the winter.

If you are not careful you could let a filet touch nasty stuff. My fillets never touch a drop of slime or internals. I’ve been told by many this is impossible. I do it every day and it’s not. There is no reason to soak any fillet if it was clean correctly. I also bleed my fish all of them. It makes them easier to clean and keep the fillets from getting contaminated with whatever might be on the cutting board.

Also in response to the OP. Thanks for the Post! They look good. But a word of advice. You need hotter oil. My paper towels on my fish plate are 100% dry. I could cook 15 lb of fish and not use an ounce of oil.

Joe Scegura wrote:

Also in response to the OP. Thanks for the Post! They look good. But a word of advice. You need hotter oil. My paper towels on my fish plate are 100% dry. I could cook 15 lb of fish and not use an ounce of oil.

Oil/pan was plenty hot, they weren’t breaded (although they kinda look like it in the pic). The recipe calls for these to be brushed with olive oil, seasoned and baked with a pat of butter on top of each fillet. Because all I had was a camp stove, I had to improvise so I did give each fillet a slight olive oil coating with a paper towel, seasoned them well, and then added extra olive oil and butter to the pan. They’re supposed to come out kind of buttery – and they did -and it was AWESOME!

ThunderLund78 wrote:

Because all I had was a camp stove, I had to improvise so I did give each fillet a slight olive oil coating with a paper towel, seasoned them well, and then added extra olive oil and butter to the pan. They’re supposed to come out kind of buttery – and they did -and it was AWESOME!

Ok, that makes sense.

Fish tastes like the care that was given to it – panfish, or any fish, if bled and put on ice immediately will be top-shelf table fare. Fish that sit in 80-90 deg livewells are essentially being cooked a la guts.

Looks like you know what you are doing in the kitchen, can appreciate fish that are prepared other than frying. Looks like it would be a good recipe for blackened fish as well.