Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Smelt Fry - a Wisconsin favorite

May 2nd in Lewiston NY the Niagara River Anglers puts on a BIG feed of smelt, gratis. Pay for your beer/pop and enjoy some smelt and good tunes. It's a blast!

I have only had the surf smelt that are rather small. I think that they are excellent cleaned and pan fried, but I could never come to terms with them left whole as some prefer them.

That larger, hooligan, variety smoked reads like it would be very good.

So is this how you guys do it....typically..?

the "tail chips " are dam good eats!!

...that's the way it was in the 60's ....!! yum!

That's a slick way to end up with a fillet. Good vid. Looks scrumptious.

I haven't had any since I was a kid.

never had smelt. Maybe one of these days I'll get a chance to try some.

Good eats!!

Deerwacker - Yep! You nailed it! You can see how fast it is to fill up a 5 gal bucket? You can fill a pick-up with buckets in no time at all. Nighttime runs are much stronger. Spring in da U.P. is cold running creeks, hiss of a Coleman lantern, pop-top of an ice cold beer fished out of said creek, and dipping!

The guy in the first vid is Fred Trost. Sadly, he passed about 5 years ago. He took over Michigan Outdoors show from the late great Mort Neff. Now the guy who has the most recent incarnation of the show lives down the street from me.

We didn't take the time to clean those things like that. Just too damn many. Steal ma's scissors, cut the head, cut the belly, run your thumb through the belly cut...next. Bread em, fry em, serve with beer. Maybe some tartar sauce or lemon. Coleslaw if you're a fitness freak. Good eats!

Used to do a lot of smelting after HS. Was an excuse to get drunk. Big bonfires on the beach, ladies in tow.

Great time.

One night me and a part smelt fished till midnight, 1/2 blitzed went to [REDACTED] Bar in Luxembourg WI as we typically did the smelt thing up in Door County. Musta been a slow night because it was me, Curt, the bartender and a bachelorette party which was just as blitzed as we were.

230 hit and the bartender goes "I'm calling this a private party - stay" and we did till about 5am. I woke up on a couch in some random 3 season room/porch. NO CLUE how I got there. Found Curt inside on the floor and we split.

I loved smelt fishing.....

Met Fred a few times - good guy to converse with.

Love them.

You're pretty close to the beach, do they ever swim up the creek the beaver were nibbling in..?

Just downed a couple dozen of Washington States Cowlitz River Smelt last weekend.

Love smelt but haven't had any fresh caught in many, many years. I still can sometimes find them, though not fresh caught, at Walmart in their frozen seafood section.

I remember when I was a kid about this time of the year the piers in Lake Michigan around Chicago used to be loaded at night with fishermen during the smelt runs. Most used gill nets on trolley rigs. Wasn't nothing to see galvanized washtubs overflowing with smelt.

Love Smelt!!

I'll have some soon!!

I do too, the small ones we got at Ashland WI were the best. Had some in the freezer for spring northern pike fishing for a couple years. The last year when they thawed they were pretty ripe, I never smelt a smelt that smelt like that smelt smelt.

We eat them and my dog gets one a day for a healthy coat!

Very common dish in Spain. One of my favorite.


Also like fried Mullet in Florida. Mullet are plentiful, travel in bunches and even jump out of the water to let you know where they are. They�re good to eat smoked or fried. And they can live anywhere from the saltiest ocean to the freshest springs.

As a result, mullet have always been the fish of choice for anyone who has to feed a large crowd. In fact, I�m not sure it�s possible to run for office in Northwest Florida without holding at least one mullet fish fry.

Dam fine eating! dip in a egg or beer batter roll in cornmeal. we go every year over to Pt Pele in Ca. My dad had a little french men buddie, he had a 40ft swein net, set up wait till dark and fill steel garage cans full! then give fish to who ever wanted them, we be cleaning fish all day long . in the afternoon mom and Gram start frying fish, Dam fine!