How To Clean Trout

How To Fillet A Trout

To fillet a trout you must first know how to clean trout.  After cleaning your trout you can filet it to remove the tasty meat from the fish.  This process of filleting will remove all of the bones from your filets so you can have all the benefits of no bones and enjoy every bit of your clean trout.

Items/Tools you will need to know how to fillet a trout:

1. Sharp fillet knife
2. Cutting board
3. Garbage/Trash/Waste receptacle/Waste bucket

Optional tools:

1. Fillet glove for extra grip
2. Fillet board with tail clip for stability

How To Fillet A Trout:

1. Clean Trout first
2. Lay the clean trout on its side on your cutting board
3. With a sharp knife cut the outside of the trout along the base of the backbone just below the head where the meat is thick. (you will want to cut as close to the rib bones as possible to have as much meat and as little waste as possible)
4. Work your blade of your fillet knife through the clean trout from the backbone to the belly and then cut the meat off of the fish from just below the head all the way to the tail.
5. Turn the trout over and do the same on the other side.
6. You now have the fillets off of the fish!  You can cook your fillets just the way they are or you can follow the steps below to remove the pin bones and/or the skin from your fillet.  Either way they will be delicious and tender!

Pin Bone removal:

The couple of small pin bones can be eaten after cooked (cooked bones are quite soft and hardly noticeable) or they can be removed before cooking.

1. First locate the pin bones on the meat towards what was the backbone of the clean trout.
2. To remove the pin bones simply make a cut on either side of the pin bones into the meat in a v pattern down the length of the bones (about one third to one half of the fish length) and remove them in one piece from the trout fillet.

Skin removal:

You can cook the trout fillet with the skin on or off depending on your preference.  When cooked with the skin on the meat tends to slide right off the skin.

1. Lay the fillet skin-side down on the cutting board and run your fillet knife between the meat and the skin starting on the thick side.
2. Start the slice all the way through the fillet from the backbone to the belly.
3. Hold the skin of the fillet tightly and run the knife firmly against the skin of the fillet and against the cutting board all the way to the tail of the trout.  This will keep all of the meat on the fillet and easily slice the skin off of the fillet.

Note: This takes a little practice however if you almost bend the fillet knife against the board (still in-between the meat and the skin) it works much easier and is a faster method to removing the skin.

Now you know how to fillet a trout!  You now have two boneless fillets you can grill or cook to your hearts delight!

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