[Striper80]

Originally Posted by Destroyer

I probably have a dozen different fillet knives. (I'm a bit of a knife junky) But the two that I keep coming back to are a set of two Dexter-Russel white handle knives I got back in 1989. (The long bladed ones, not the short ones) I also have some high carbon steel D-R's with the wood handles that keep an edge forever, and are great but stain easily.

As previously mentioned, the real trick is to keep them razor sharp by stropping them after a few fish. Most of the fish I catch and keep are Fluke, and I clean Fluke differently than most people since I hate to waste their meat. I put each fish on a board that has one of those spring clamp devices to hold the fish by the tail. Then I use a utility knife (Stanley type, each razor sharp blade will only do a few fish so make sure you get the kind that can instantly switch out a dull blade)) to cut along the outside edge of each fish, from the gills to tail, then I use a pair of Vise Grips to grab and pull back the skin from the tail up to the head. From there it's an easy task to run my thumb down along the spine to divide the meat, and then the D-R's come out to cut the meat away from the bones. Perfect fillets each time. I know that professional mates do it a different, faster way, but that wastes a lot of meat in the process IMHO, so this is the way I fillet them.

My friends father used to do it like that. I remember being at the fillet table behind Atlantic highlands bait and tackle as a kid and he'd be ripping it off with pliers. We'd rent a boat from Pete and put a nice catch together. Not happening these days.