Chesapeake Bay mullet... commonly known as round head is a wonderful Chesapeake Bay fish. You can only catch them by net though.

I have made friends with some local commercial fisherman and buy fish directly off the dock, less than 1 hour old typically. The price is a tiny fraction of what you pay at the grocery store.

So far this summer it has been Spanish mackerel, small Tanner Bluefish, speckled trout/weakfish and mullet. The mullet is one of my favorites.

Decided to smoke about 20 today. Applewood. They came out very well. Probably will smoke a couple of hundred pounds more and put up in vacuum seal bags for the winter. At $1.50 a pound it's a great source of super tasty protein.

Are they oily?

Oil smokes to the surface/skin and drips/bastes.

I used to live in Bayfield Wisconsin and ate a whole lot of smoked Whitefish, smoked chub and smoked trout.

I would say smoked chub and smoked mullet are very similar... but chub are much smaller. I smoke mullet in the 1-2 lb range.

Applewood is a little mild in my opinion. I may try Hickory or Mesquite next.

Not sure if you can find it....but Alder wood is apparently popular for fishies.

Are the mullet different in flavor than the striped mullet? I have had very good ones from Virginia and Florida but the Texas ones got relegated to bait only after one try. I probably did something wrong, or maybe it is the species? Do you brine or cure them first? Sweet or salty if you do?

Have done lots of Salmon and other fish so I know the technique.

Nice Jim...

I would never have thought of that but I can see it.

Not really sure so hesitant to compare.

I did not brine them. Cleaned in the morning and belly down on the rack a few hours later. There's a layer of fat between the skin and the meat as in most fish. The fat helped baste them well.

In my opinion the Applewood smoked was too mild. I will go with Hickory or Mesquite or possibly pecan next time.

I consider Chesapeake Bay Mueller to be one of the best small fish in the bay... by small I mean under 2 pounds typically. I find the meat to be firm with no unpleasant oily fish flavor. Better than trout and better than small blue fish. Absolutely better than Croaker or spot.

I would say the meat most compares to that of a nice 2 lb flounder
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On a side note, our pears have started to come in. We have Bartlett as well as Asian.

I core the pears and remove any imperfections... then I run them through a super heavy duty blender AKA Blendtec. Make several runs to liquify the pears the very best I can and mitigate any pear grit.

Then we blend it with citrus juice of choice as well as cardamom lots of cinnamon lots of vanilla... molasses and or brown sugar.

It comes out as a dark brown pear butter, much like apple butter but far better in my opinion.

I use this as a dipping sauce for the smoked fish. It's quite a nice combination. I do wish the fish had more smoke, but still completely okay.

Very interesting on the mullet. I've never tried it, but my dad catches the hell out of those bastards in Florida. Not sure if it's the same type of mullet, though. He uses them for bait, while surf fishing. I know he tried cooking them when they first moved there, but pompano seems like the prized fish in the surf.

I actually like bluefish, and tried sailcat for the first time. Both are trash fish to some, but I don't mind the flavor or texture.

Peach butter has it all over apple butter. And I love apple butter.
Overnight in the crockpot
Pear butter I haven’t had since dad used to make it.

We fish the Pacific side of Panama. The jack crevalle fish on the Pacific side is called a Jurel.

Local fisherman told me it's really good for your heart, but the guys I fish with say you cannot eat it.

I spiced up some fillets and cooked it in a frying pan. It was okay. Then I broke up the fillets and mix them with potato chip crumbles, mayonnaise and hot sauce and made fish cakes. It was quite tasty that way.

With all that extra crap in it probably no longer good for the heart. But was able to figure out how to take a less-than-desirable fish and make it delicious.

Made a veal parmesan out of bullnose Ray two summers ago. Really surprisingly good. Tasted absolutely nothing like fish, and very much like veal.

Anybody can bake or fry a rockfish, drum, salmon or steak a tuna, shark, wahoo or halibut. I like to fiddle fart around with other fish that don't bake so well.

I hate croaker and consider sea trout to be only slightly better.

YMMV

I've heard stingray is good eating. Bowfishing for them looks like fun.

That white stuff is fat coming outta the meat
Form a pellicle next time

The bull nose Ray I harvested with fairly large. About 40 to 50 lbs I would guess.

I took a large fillet out of one of the wings... parboiled it. The musculature of the filet fell open almost like sliced bread. I sliced it into cutlets accordingly. Then prepared a traditional veal parmesan.

The internet was full of conversation about urea smell and taste. I found none of that whatsoever. The texture of the meat in my opinion was very much like lamb or baked pork chops... and pleasantly moist.

They would be striped mullet. We have white mullet too but they are very small.

Some people tell me it tastes like scallops. I'd like to try some.