How To Cut Trout, Including Fillets Or Steaks And Peel Off Scales + Video

2024 Author: Bailey Albertson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 12:53

How to clean and cut trout without fuss

Trout meat is a delicious product. Delicate, soft, rather fatty, it is good in any form. Trout fish soup, baked, smoked, grilled trout, with lemon and ginger - the meat just melts in your mouth. Like any fish, trout is much healthier than meat and is more easily absorbed by the body, literally making some organs healthy. The only problem is that, like any fish, it needs to be cleaned and cut before cooking.

What kind of fish is trout

Trout likes clean, oxygen-rich water

Char, trout, trout, Clark's salmon, golden trout, rainbow trout - all these are the names of trout. This fish belongs to the salmon family, lives in salt and fresh water, and lends itself to breeding in artificial conditions. Trout lives in lakes, streams, rivers, preferring mountain ones with cool and clear water. Fish are very sensitive to the cleanliness of their habitat; when contaminants enter the water, they are one of the first to die.

Trout is distinguished by a variety of colors

Trout coloration is surprisingly variable and varies with habitat, food and season. The back is usually greenish, the sides are yellowish-green, with chaotically scattered rounded spots, the belly is whitish-gray. The skin is covered with small scales, the muzzle is dull. Males can be distinguished by their larger head and smaller, compared to females, in size. Trout can weigh up to 20 kg, but fish 20-30 cm in size and weighing up to 1 kg are more common.

The color of the meat is also different: white, yellowish, pink. In river trout, the color of the meat is paler than that of sea trout. The benefits are due to vitamins A, group B, E, D contained in meat, essential fatty acids Omega3, amino acids and trace elements that regulate cholesterol levels, strengthen the nervous system and heart, prevent the development of cancer, help normalize blood pressure, and have a beneficial effect on skin and hair …

Despite the fact that the meat is quite fat, its calorie content is only 88 kcal per 100 grams, which makes it a dietary product.

How to clean and cut

It is unlikely that for someone cleaning fish is a favorite pastime. Scales scatter throughout the kitchen, hands and cutting boards smell of fish for a long time, entrails leave dirty brown marks. Remembering these inconveniences, you begin to convince yourself that you don't really want fresh fish.

Having learned how to clean and cut fish correctly and quickly, you will no longer be intimidated by such a prospect.

For cleaning and cutting trout you will need

• knife;
• cutting board;
• grater or metal sponge for dishes;
• tea spoon.

Operating procedure

1. Most experienced fishermen gut the fish first. For this, an incision is made with a sharp knife from the anus to the head. Grasping the insides at the junction of the torso with the head, swinging movements separate the insides and take them out.
2. A knife is used to cut the film along the ridge inside the belly, and a teaspoon is used to scrape off the blood from the head to the tail.
3. Raising the gill flaps, the gills are cut with a knife at the points of attachment to the head, and removed.
4. Since the scales of a trout are very small and close to each other, it is very difficult to clean them with a knife. For this work, a fine grater or a metal dish sponge is suitable. For convenience, put the fish in the shell, brush in the direction from the tail to the head, as if grinding the skin, the scales will easily come off.
5. Wash the trout and you can start cooking if you intend to fry or bake it whole.

How to cut trout and remove gills - video

If necessary, cut into fillets

1. The carcass is cut at the base of the head to the ridge. The knife is rotated 90 degrees and an incision is made as close to the ridge as possible from head to tail. One half is separated.
2. The carcass is turned over and the same is done on the other side. The remaining head with a ridge will go to the ear.
3. Now the rib bones are thinly cut in a solid layer. The same is done with the dorsal ones, simultaneously separating the fins. It is important to have a well-sharpened knife so as not to tear the meat and the cut is thin.
4. The remaining bones along the central line are removed with tweezers or pliers, they are easy to find with your fingers.
5. The fillet is placed skin side down. Holding the skin at the tail, a long thin knife separates the skin from the fillet in one motion. In small fish, this can be done by stripping the skin with a stocking from head to tail to filleting.

How to cut trout into fillets - video

How to separate caviar from films

If you are lucky enough to have caviar in the fish, you can pickle it. Then you have a homemade sandwich delicacy. But first, the caviar must be separated from the films. This can be done in two ways:

The first way

1. Pour hot water, about 70 ⁰ C, into a bowl, dissolve 2 teaspoons of salt in it and immerse the caviar in the brine.
2. Stir the caviar in the brine intensively with a fork, tearing and separating the films.
3. Beat the mass with a whisk, periodically removing the adhering film flakes.
4. Filter the mass through a fine sieve, rinse, remove the remaining films.

Second way

1. Rub the caviar through a grater. Most of the films will remain on it. Do not press hard to avoid damaging the eggs.
2. Rinse and filter as in the first case.
3. You can start salting.

How to clean caviar from films - video

Frozen trout

If the fish is frozen, remove the skin from it before defrosting it. It's easier to do this with a frozen carcass. To do this, pour boiling water over it, armed with pliers, pick up the edge of the skin and remove it with a stocking. After that, defrost the fish and cut as usual.

Video on how to quickly remove the skin from frozen trout

Trout can be cooked whole

The need to clean fish is not a reason to refuse such a healthy and tasty dish. Now you know how to simplify this not too pleasant work for yourself and the return of your husband with the catch will not spoil your mood. And may you not only have a fish day on Thursday.