# Cleaning Fish?



## PrincessinAK (Jul 24, 2005)

Help! Does anyone have any tips they can share on how to properly clean and easily debone salmon? 

Edited to add I found a great guide in my Joy of cooking book shoulda looked there first before mutilating the first couple fishies, my fi'llets are looking great now! I love joy of cooking :0)


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## GB (Jul 24, 2005)

That is great that you figured it out  
I have never done it before, but I am sure I would destroy the first few ones that I attempt LOL.


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## pdswife (Jul 24, 2005)

sorry.. no help here.  I'll put the worm on and I'll fish all day.. but, once the wiggly thing is off the hook hubby has to come take over.  
I love sushi but, other raw fish grosses me out.


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## BBQ Fish (Jul 25, 2005)

That's cool that you found a way to do it because it's hard to explain w/o pics. 
Just outta curiosity though, what method did it give you? 

Lastly, i use this to get the bones out------\/





Fish bone tweezers My wife bought it for me as a joke, but they really do work with minimal effort!


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## PrincessinAK (Jul 26, 2005)

BBQ Fish~ You're absolutly right, it would be hard to explain w/o pics. Those tweezers look great I have been using my fingers. :0)


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## Rob Babcock (Jul 26, 2005)

I use a needle nosed pliers- very handy, at least on the bigger fishies!  My salmon cleaning experience is limited to the sides of salmon I've used in restaurants.  All that's left to do with them is skin 'em and pluck out the pin bones.


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## BBQ Fish (Jul 26, 2005)

Princess- How are you able to do that with your fingers? Maybe because i have bigger hands, or (what my friends call) "Musician Meat Hooks" i can't seem to grab the pin bones. 

The tweezers give a good amount of leverage though, because it allows you to rest your hand on, or very near to the fillet, letting you pluck, insted of pull the bones out.

I thought i should mention one of the fastest methods of cleaning salmon that i know of. I'm not to sure about this name, but my friend calls it the Follow, Flip, Skin method.....And yes, w/o pics 

With an electric or fillet knife, cut right behind the gill, and turn the knife toward the tail. Follow the back bone to about 1" before the body ends at the tail. Flip the fillet so the meat side is up. While still attached to the fish continue cut, now under the meat to skin the fish.

It's as easy as that


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## jpmcgrew (Jul 26, 2005)

As rob babcock says the needle nose pliers are the way to go but you really need to get the bones right at the top of meat or else you get really big gouges in meat.Ive tried tweezers but they dont seem to have the gripping quality the pliers have.


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## AllenOK (Jul 26, 2005)

I have to agree.  Every cook/chef I've worked with uses a small pair of needle nose pliers to get the pinbones out.  We keep them clean, and don't use them for anything else.


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## PrincessinAK (Jul 28, 2005)

Thanks for the suggestions! I think I still have my old needle nose pliers that I used to make wire jewelry out of. I'll have to find them and put them back into use again.


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## marmalady (Jul 28, 2005)

Don't forget to 'scale' the fish, also, to remove all those nasty scales!  To keep from getting them all over the kitchen, I put the fish or fillet in a plastic grocery bag, then use a knife to run along the skin against the 'grain' to remove the scales.


Nothing like biting into a piece of succulent fish, and crunching down on a scale!


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