Being able to bring your newly caught fish from freshwater to your kitchen or cooktop can be one of the most fulfilling achievements when it comes to upgrading your fishing and cooking skills. This wouldn’t be possible without the best resources on hand, such as fishing knives and the knowledge on how to use them—that heavenly recipe on your cookbook won’t prepare itself!
Pack your stuff, strategically use your baits, and send that mouth-watering piece of fish frying in its most appetizing chunks with garnish. This article will dive into the practice of food preservation and how the world’s best fish fillet knife set—American Legacy fishing knives—will make food preparations easier both at home and outdoors.
Compared to the average fishing knife set, the American legacy fishing knife collection exhibits a globally distinguished condition and usage—all thanks to the Dexter-Russell manufacturing company, which has consistently produced these premium fishing knives for nearly 200 years. This item boasts premium quality and comes with a lifetime warranty. That said, it is usually priced at 85 USD, but some knife and kitchen essential companies would provide a discount of up to 50-60% on each fish knife set.
For this section, we will take a closer look at this knife’s features based on three angles: standard properties, functional properties, and aesthetic properties.
Now that you know what original American legacy fishing knives are, it is just as important to identify the rip-off products. You would know which ones are fake based on these observations. Beware of fraud products that showcase any of the following descriptions:
Regardless of what you purchased, be it a regular or personalized American legacy fishing knife collection, the lifetime warranty is guaranteed to address breakage or mishandling concerns.
The custom sheaths are also available for those who want a more distinctive and individual touch to their knives. These attributes are granted such that you can enjoy unique and high-powered incision knives.
You can also safely keep your knife set with exclusive leather sheaths that have been carefully designed with a rear belt loop plus a handle retention layout to match the expert structure of your knife.
Furthering the discussion on fishing or filleting knife care, you can prevent rust from forming on carbon steel for several years just by cleaning and wiping your blades dry after every use with a thin coat of cooking oil, then sheathing them.
Finally have your own set of American Legacy fishing knives? Let’s start learning how to fillet, prepare, and preserve your freshly caught fish.
It requires timing and a lot of patience to reel in fish, especially if you’re a novice angler. As they would put it, the practice will test both your grit and self-control. While it may be perceived as a time-consuming activity for greenhorns who apply the trial and error strategies, you can only imagine how rewarding it would be to finally comprehend the ways of the water and reel in a long-awaited catch.
What comes after is preparing to transition freshly caught fish to food using humane practices. Properly doing this step increases the freshness of your catch and prevents early spoilage. This is followed by removing the scales and getting rid of the innards.
While typically done consequently, catching fish and filleting them are two entirely different ballparks—experienced cooks would agree that fishing is as simple as casting out a line with bait and patiently waiting, while filleting demands both precision and finesse to make sure you’re left with the most meat to cook or prepare.
It is crucial to be aware of how you can fillet and chop your fish before taking it to your kitchen; after all, the correct filleting process can give you appropriate proportions for a banquet and make meals seem more filling. On top of that, freshly cutting fish into fillets taste more scrumptious and flavorful than pre-cuts.
Filleting a fish may require a lot of skill and mastery, but it’s not impossible to learn. For your reference, here are three tips on how you can fillet a fish by yourself:
For starters, you need to bleed out a freshly caught fish to preserve it. Do this by making a surface-level cut beneath the fish gills using a fishing knife and snap its head towards the back so you can break its spinal cord. Afterward, thread through its mouth and to the gills to ensure that the blood spills out and back to the water for a couple of minutes.
The next thing that you must do is descale the fish using the backside of your knife and scrape off its scales with long strokes beginning at the tail and towards the head of the fish. As an alternative option, you may first fillet the fish and then skin it so that you can remove all of its scales too.
When you’re done with that, you may cut the fish’s stomach open to reveal and remove the guts inside it; cut across its body by running a fish cutting knife through it from the lower body and up to its head. Make sure to wear gloves as you take off the guts by hand, then rinse the inside portion of your fish to check if any organs have been left out.
Finally, chop off the fish’s gills and head with a knife. Add some pressure, cut through the spine, and follow through to cleave the head from its body.
In the second phase, cut the fins away along the sides, the top, and the bottom side. Complete this part to execute more precise slices.
Run your knife down the fish’s spine from its tail to its head and make another run over the rib cage, then through it. To apply this technique, use the fish’s backbone as a guide and try to incorporate a smooth, gentle, and delicate slicing motion. Avoid roughly cutting across or sawing through the bones. Repeat this process for the other side. Done correctly, you’ll end up with two substantial fillet slices. You may remove fish bones using a tweezer towards the end.
Focus next on cutting each fillet into steak slabs, the kind you would often see in restaurants or on cooking shows. Just follow the 1.5-inch or 3.8-centimeter thickness rule and keep the length and width generally small, especially for large fish like salmon.
Lastly, you need to debone the fillets with a set of large tweezers or knives with a deboning facet. This should be easier to do since the flesh has already been separated from the spine. Feel through the meat and check for fishbone.
As mentioned earlier, you can take your fish cleaning knife set out to skin the fillet. Simply place the skin side of the fish down and slowly move your knife to slice through the flesh and skin’s meeting point while pulling the skin away as you cut. Depending on your preference, you may trim some of the excess fat like those on the belly area by following the same steak-cutting technique.
Do not forget to rinse the fillet with running water and gently dry it with a paper towel so that you won’t leave a trace of fiber on the meat. Should you plan to cook the fillets on a later date, secure them in a plastic wrap, pack them inside a tightly sealed ziplock bag, and store these in the freezer or an icebox. This way, your fish will maintain its excellent qualities for 2 to 3 months in the cooler.
Should you prefer to just keep your newly caught fish, you will need to exercise proper storage and preservation techniques to make that happen. According to Michigan State University (MSU), here are some tips which you may want to keep in mind regarding preservation:
Did you learn anything new or interesting about our American Legacy Fishing Knife Collection? Let us know how you would fillet your freshwater fish by sharing your thoughts in the comments below!
