# Anybody here can their own fish?



## Oomingmak

I think most of us, regardless of how much fishing we did during the season with our parents, grew up on canned salmon or tuna for sandwiches when we were kids. Up here, where the lakes and rivers are hard and you can drive a truck on them for 7 months of the year, getting fresh fish to eat is not always an easy task unless you are in to ice fishing. My wife hates ice fishing.

The price of good canned salmon and tuna has slowly crept up over the years and to be honest, I just don't care for canned tuna that much. We also noticed that the canned salmon companies are playing the same game as chocolate bars, keep the price the same, but slowly reduce the size of the can to increase profits. 

Then of course there is the problem with the Pacific salmon now all testing positive for radiation from the continual dump of contaminated water at Fukushima. Over time I imagine we will see the radiation levels in fish climb and eventually we can probably make salmon sandwiches that glow in the dark. 

Anyways, for a variety of reasons we decided to start canning our own fish.............. same old thing, we know where it came from and we know what is going into it. During the soft water season we catch a fair number of lake trout, rainbow and brown trout, walleye and northern pike. 

The last few limits of walleye for the season get frozen to eat during the winter. Our first attempts at canning were with with trout and, not surprisingly they turn out pretty much just like salmon. With lake trout you need to be careful to try and use smaller fish, say 3 to 6 pounds, as the bigger ones start to get fatty and that reduces the quality and taste of the finished product. Rainbow and brown trout of any legal size work nicely.

The big surprise was that northern pike makes excellent canned fish. It is light coloured meat but a few drops of ketchup in the jars before canning will add a bit of colour and a drop or two of liquid smoke also adds a great deal of flavour. We actually add the liquid smoke now to all of our canned fish.

I fillet all the fish, so the large backbone is removed, and take the ribs off. You can leave all the bones in if you want to, they do in most of the commercial stuff, as the canning process softens the bones completely. But, we find the finished canned fish is much nicer if only the small lateral line and Y bones are left in, as they virtually disappear in the canning process.

With the trout species I leave the skin on but descale. With northern pike I strip the skin off of the fillets because they are just such slimy damn things and the skin is thicker than on trout. It is of course up to the individual, but we prefer the northern pike skinned.

As I mentioned previously, the most surprising thing was how good the northern pike turns out. People we have fed it to had no idea and assumed it was canned salmon. The other nice thing is that a limit of nice plump northerns of around 25 - 27 inches in length produces a heck of a pile of canned fish.

Canning your own fish is just one more way you can save some money and make sure your family is eating good food free of the weird and harmful things that so many commercial products are filled with.


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## Hooch

When I lived on the coast, I canned tuna and salmon often. For exciting flavor..I added chinese sweet garlic chili hot sauce..just a dab, often with a garlic clove. I also added a slab/slice/chunk of smoked bacon in there...oooh!! Fresh ocean salmon with a chunk of smoked bacon..omg!! 
Ive tasted smoked canned trout n salmon too. Its smoked over alder wood then canned..its tender n insanly good and keeps a long time that way.


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## cowboyhermit

Years back, we canned a lot of jackfish (pike), partly just because of all the darn bones. We would even can in quarts, most people seemed to really enjoy it.

We have relatives in B.C that will can us some salmon on a good year. They started using more widemouth pints instead of half pints and it seems to work well for us.

Unfortunately these days we don't often get large amounts of those types of fish, maybe I will get some ice fishing in the year.


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## jeff47041

About 30 years ago, we drained our biggest pond. It was overrun with 4" catfish and LOTS of carp.

We drained it completely and caught all of the fish. We got very few "good" fish out of it. We cleaned all of the carp and had a big fish fry..It was tasty enough. One of our neighbors took about a hundred pounds of carp home and canned it. I don't know if he canned it in tomato juice or just added some in each jar. It was really great tasting though.


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## FatTire

Im working on aquaponics using trout, kewl and informative thread, thanks!


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## Caribou

I can my own salmon. The canning process enhances the smoke flavor so I only smoke fish for canning for between 1/2 to one hour.

Some years ago I ran across a recipe for smoked salmon that used soy sauce, brown sugar, a diced onion, and some granulated garlic as the brine. I would smoke that, after drying to a glaze, for about a half hour for cooking and a full smoke for munching. I would boil up a pot of cut up potatoes. When the potatoes were about half done I'd lay a couple of serving sized pieces of lightly smoked salmon on top, cover, and cook till everything was finished. Smoked salmon, buttered potatoes, and creamed peas.


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## hashbrown

Growing up we canned White Suckers and Yellow Suckers. I haven't been hungry enough to think about canning those in 25 years!


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## Oomingmak

hashbrown said:


> Growing up we canned White Suckers and Yellow Suckers. I haven't been hungry enough to think about canning those in 25 years!


LOL........ a lot of the old Ukrainian settler families that live in the farm country around home can suckers. They swear by it, but my wife simply will not try it. :lalala:

She has this thing where eating suckers probably rates right up there with BBQ coyote.


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## tamitik

hashbrown said:


> Growing up we canned White Suckers and Yellow Suckers. I haven't been hungry enough to think about canning those in 25 years!


when I lived above winnipeg, a neighbour asked if I wanted to try sucker.

I said "sure":cheers:

he brot me a pickup load.

lol

needless to say.

we had cases of canned sucker and with a little ketchup, it looked and tasted just like salmon.

prairie salmon.

now if you still cant bring yourself to eat it.. why not do a batch for your pets?


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## Oomingmak

tamitik

Yes you can get a pile of those suckers when they are spawning. I usually catch some in the spring and use them to make fish oil, which I then use for making various lures for trapping season.

No can do with the dogs............ we have 4 and it would take about a 1000 canning jars to get that accomplished.
:laugh:

We currently have 2 mini schnauzers, a german shepherd and a doberman. I am thinking that I really would not like results of feeding canned sucker to the schnauzers, which sleep on our bed........ the air quality might be affected. It is bad enough with those two little land sharks from feeding them moose and deer scraps.


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## Oomingmak

FatTire said:


> Im working on aquaponics using trout, kewl and informative thread, thanks!


That is neat! Please keep us informed on how that works for you. Have often thought about it, but wonder how it would all work with our cold winters and if we could keep everything working at a decent temperature during the coldest months.

I see Devil's Tower in the background of your avatar. That is a cool formation............. always reminds me of the "Close Encounters" Spielberg movie.


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## rhrobert

jeff47041 said:


> About 30 years ago, we drained our biggest pond. It was overrun with 4" catfish and LOTS of carp.
> 
> We drained it completely and caught all of the fish. We got very few "good" fish out of it. We cleaned all of the carp and had a big fish fry..It was tasty enough. One of our neighbors took about a hundred pounds of carp home and canned it. I don't know if he canned it in tomato juice or just added some in each jar. It was really great tasting though.


My dad always canned carp. He made up patties and people who swore they would never eat carp thought it was salmon. Good stuff.


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## Oomingmak

rhrobert said:


> My dad always canned carp. He made up patties and people who swore they would never eat carp thought it was salmon. Good stuff.


I had a couple of hunters this year from a small country in Europe. They don't have turkey at Christmas, they cook a big carp. Apparently they get a nice big carp and keep it alive in a bathtub until it is time to cook it at Christmas.
Just about fell off my chair when I heard that one.


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## readytogo

*Canning Seafood Help.*

I try canning fish once is time consuming and can be expensive if not done properly , http://nchfp.uga.edu/how/can_05/alaska_can_fish_qtjars.pdf , haven`t done it in a while but I rather smoked it and pack it in oil , http://nchfp.uga.edu/how/can_05/smoked_fish.html , or my grandfather`s way of plain salted fish in plenty of sea salt, cod fish is the best for this ,it last forever and is delicious prepared Mediterranean style after de-salting ,we did this in Cuba with meaty fish like sharks and groupers and also squids ,we had no refrigeration During my service time and travels thru Korea I learn a few things, salting and air drying under the hot sun was the way, the key here is to make sure that there is no moisture left in the meat , http://www.fishfiles.com.au/handling/preserving/Pages/drying.aspx ,good luck.


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## hashbrown

tamitik said:


> when I lived above winnipeg, a neighbour asked if I wanted to try sucker.
> 
> I said "sure":cheers:
> 
> he brot me a pickup load.
> 
> lol
> 
> needless to say.
> 
> we had cases of canned sucker and with a little ketchup, it looked and tasted just like salmon.
> 
> prairie salmon.
> 
> now if you still cant bring yourself to eat it.. why not do a batch for your pets?


I just cant bring myself to can them anymore. We still go snag a mess every year my wife and son love to catch them. I usually hunt morels and poke shoots while they snag so we can have a good creek side meal and try to keep up with the scaling and scoring while the snag. When they are running you can easily get hundreds of them I just wont do the work that hard for something I despise so much. It was a staple of our diet when i was a kid I hated them then and wont waste too much energy on them now. They are much better fried on the creek bank than in a jar.


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## tamitik

a feast fit for a king..

buy that woman a new pair of pants, son.

they is past wore out.


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## Oomingmak

tamitik said:


> a feast fit for a king..
> 
> buy that woman a new pair of pants, son.
> 
> they is past wore out.


Your age is showing. Don't ya know that is in style 
these days. Seems to me it was back in the 70's at one point to. 

Hashbrown.......... good looking family and some good times. :beercheer:


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