Yellowtail Butchery...

[dsafety]

Did you use a knife or meat saw to cut the steaks? The cuts look so clean and even. Tough to do with a knife.

I like to remove as much of the red meat as possible when I clean a YT so my fish-hating wife does not complain as much about the fishy smell and taste. This does not look like it would be easy to do when cutting the fish into steaks. Any advise on that subject?

Bob

Bob,

First, I'll address the fish, then your wife.

Once gutted and gilled the whole fish goes
on ice, for at least a day.

Lay the fish on its side. First, I prep the skin with
a running hose of water and a butterknife. I
run the knife over the fish, heavy-handed, as
if I were scaling it. This removes the slime coat
remenants and preps the fish skin for eating. That's
right, it's a source of omega 3s and a wonderful
mouth feel crunch off the BBQ.

For the cuts, you need a very sharp knife and a hack-saw.
I use a a curved Victorinox fillet knife, available at
most tackle shops.

With the fish on its side make V shaped cuts, about 1.5"
deep, along the fish's lateral line, gill to tail. This will
remove that God awful dark meat...

Now decide if you want to separate the belly meat.
If so, cut out the meat as per my photo.

Now the steaks:

Cut them into 1.5" cuts for the thickness. Take single
stokes to the bone. Make all the steak cuts down the
line. Now take the hack saw and only cut thru the bone,
carefully. Then take your knife and finish cutting the
steaks. You don't have flip the fish over.



Now to help with the wife. Here's what I do to
minimize the odors at home:

Bleed fish by cutting gills and tail. Tail cutting
allows for better blood drainage via venting.

Gut and gill fish in the water. Could be dangerous,
but after all, life is a movie.

Keep fish on ice 24hrs.

Prep fish when she isn't around.

Side note. My dad is 105 yrs old. He, like my 95 yr old
mother-in-law has all his marbles and plays an active
role in our lives. They grew up eating oil fish meat.
Anchovies, Sardines, Macks, Tuna were all consumed
without ever separating the dark and lite meats.

Omega 3 fatty acid has been shown to reduce overall
and cardiovascular mortality, myocardial infarction,
and sudden cardiac death.

Regular eating of fatty fish, lowers triglycerides, and
is a natural anti-inflammatory for people with arthritis.
Thereby reducing anti-inflammatory drug use.

Even the American Heart Association Dietary Guidelines
committee recommends to the general population
the consumption of at least two servings of
fatty fish per week.


Tell her La Jolla's Yelowtail is the Fountain of Youth.
If that don't work, use a clothespin.

[Whizz Bang]

Again, thank you Yani. I will be trying this out....hopefully soon.

[dsafety]

Yani,

I do not see the cuts along the lateral line in your photos. Do you do that from the other side?

Bob

Bob,

I would never cut out the dark meat. That was the
whole point of my sermon...

But, refer to the first pic in this post. Look at my
steaks. See the cross section? You can see the
dark meat you want to cut out. It runs along the
fish's lateral line. It's in a V shape. Then follow
my directions and you'll have Yellowtail Steaks
without the dark meat and its nutrients.

If you insist on not eating the nutrient rich, life giving,
viagra like, dark meat, boil it, freeze it, then bring
it out when you need chum when bait is hard to come by.

[TCS]

This is one of those posts I will go back to over and over. Thank you for writing it. The only question I have is about the 24 hour icing. I made sushi with my YT this week just a few hours after catching it. Yum. What would icing for 24 hours have changed?

Now I just need a fish to try it on. Tomorrow maybe?

[Fiskadoro]

Originally Posted by TCS

What would icing for 24 hours have changed?

This is kinda gross but if your talking sushi or sashimi technically it does two things, one the flesh decomposes a bit which "ages" it which makes it more tender, with a better flavor, and two some of the parasites that might be present in the flesh cant survive in dead flesh so they die.

Personally I gut my fish, cut off their heads and tails wrap them in newspaper and freeze them whole. Then thaw them out and cut them up for sashimi which seasons the fish as well and in theory limits your exposure to bad things like parasites.

Jim

[cioppino]

Icing fish.

In general icing a whole fish for a day or two is going to help firm up the meat making it easier to fillet. YT are pretty firm from the get go but WSB can be a bit soft. You can keep the meet fresh longer too by icing a whole fish. Say you catch it on Tuesday and dont want to eat it until Saturday. Just ice it until Saturday morning. It is important to keep the fish from sitting in water though. I leave the plug open on the cooler and use shaved ice.
I ice yt for a day or two tops. WSB and Halibut get two to three days before getting the knife. I gill and gut on the water and will now be slicing the tail to help the bleeding as that really seems to make sense.

As far as sashimi goes I do not know if you are keeping yourself from getting sick or not when it comes to icing the fish first. We have eaten tuna so fresh it was still twitching and warm when we ate it. None of us ever got sick. Icing to me is merely a way to improve the quality of my fillets while extending the time I have to deal with a catch.

Thanks for the info Yani

[WahooUSMA]

You mean to tell me I don't need a viagra prescription anymore, I just need to catch more YT? Damn, I get to kill two birds with one stone - what a great excuse to tell mama!

On a serious note - thank you for your knowledge and insight into the prep of YT. Now, I just need to catch one!

Originally Posted by yani

Bob,
If you insist on not eating the nutrient rich, life giving,
viagra like, dark meat, boil it, freeze it, then bring
it out when you need chum when bait is hard to come by.

[Willy]

Great Post!
Tom's right, this post is a revisit for sure.

As far as the sashimi parasite thing I'll drop my $.02.
We're not talking about bacteira here, but little wormy guys.
Any bacteria would come from poorly handled meat, or a poorly cleaned fish.
The parasites that would be in there, if they were, are visible.

I'm not saying they're like dancing around like little taliban on the fish meat, but if you look good and hard you'll see them, if they are there at all, and it's really unlikely any are there.

Freezing the fish, or icing it for 24 hours will kill 'em if they are there, if you're really worried about it.

The fatty oily meat (belly, collar) is the best, and quite 'pure' looking and easy to once over if you're worried about it.

My wife (an unbelievable cook from Japan), swears the fresher the better. The proof for me is in her puddin.

Good luck all,
Bon appitite.

Willy