Cooking FW trout:

[AndyS]

I baked them for 30 mins @ 400

Then peeled off the skin, then peeled the meat off the bones.

I like my food well done so a little bit more in the frying pan, picking out more bones. Now I remember why I don't keep these things, all bones !

Best trout I ever had was from the smoker with Applewood chips.
Best trout I ever ate came from Round Valley.

I see people keeping these small Weakfish, same thing, all bones ???

[Jigman13]

At least you tried? Lol... I could never acclimate to the taste of freshwater fish, no matter how drunk I got they still tasted 'off'. I'll buy chicken instead... or try for a tog

[AndyS]

Freshwater fish taste like the seasonings you put on them. BUT, there is always walleye and yellow perch caught through the ice. I heard you cook the yellow perch tidbits after cleaning, then put them in the fridge. Dip 'em in cocktail sauce, heard they are as good as shrimp !

[Lard Almighty]

Stocked trout are soft and have a slight liver taste to them. Once they've been in the river/lake for a few months they get much firmer and sweeter. Provided it's a clean body of water; otherwise they taste like mud.

I will cook the stockies in butter and white wine, then flake the meat off and make fish cakes out of them. I just repurposed a crab cake recipe and go heavy on the old bay.

[Gerry Zagorski]

I brined and smoked it with Alder and is was pretty tasty. Alder is best since it won't power the fish...

[frugalfisherman]

I don't trout fish but my neighbor gave me 24 rainbows that he and his buddies caught near Lambertville. My job is to smoke them. Almost all were small maybe 6-8 inches heads off. Brined for 2 days and smoked with oak. Once smoked the center bone peals right off meat. Tastes great. There was 0ne big trout about 18 inches head off (guess he was stocked a few years ago) so I made slits on sides and stuffed with lots of parsley and lemon to bake. It seems very similar to salmon. A bit oily.

[Dclark2]

Best Trout I ever tasted was headed, dipped in flour and fried in bacon grease at stream side.

[bulletbob]

Originally Posted by AndyS

I baked them for 30 mins @ 400

Then peeled off the skin, then peeled the meat off the bones.

I like my food well done so a little bit more in the frying pan, picking out more bones. Now I remember why I don't keep these things, all bones !

Best trout I ever had was from the smoker with Applewood chips.
Best trout I ever ate came from Round Valley.

I see people keeping these small Weakfish, same thing, all bones ???

No Weakfish are not bony like fw Trout.. More of a Bluefish/Striper type skeleton.. I found them easy to fillet totally bone free.

Stocked trout are awful, I mean really bad at times... Much better when they in the water for a while, eat natural food and and gain some color.

These days I am forced to eat only fw water fish, and i will take yellow perch, and sunnies over anything else.. walleyes are good as well from cold clean water too, but not as easy to come by. Laker/Browns/Rainbows from the big lakes up here?.. Strong, greasy and nasty,, Think of a Bluefish taste combined with that very strong "mossy" taste many FW fish have.. Can't be masked either. LL Salmon are good however, even with the same forage base in the same lakes. Can't say why that is.. Just not crazy about stocked trout, SMB, Bullheads, Catfish, big trout out of big lakes, but up here, people take all that stuff, and I keep the perch ,sunnies, and rock bass to eat. Pike are very sweet and white as well, but are so full of Y bones, that I don't bother with them. I REALLY really miss eating fresh salt water fish, even stronger tasting stuff like Blues/Weaks... fw fish just have that "mossy" thing going on that I personally can't abide.