# Tips for cooking big channel cats?



## Fishman (Apr 5, 2004)

Took a big channel cat home today, about 15lbs take or give a pound. Sorry no pictures, forgot the dog-gone digital camera!! This thing was huge for a channel, and probably one of the biggest channel cats I've saw in a long long time.. My girlfriend wanted a fish dinner and the crappie wern't cooperating. Either way, I love catfish and have eatten my fair share of "small" farm raised channels and had no trouble deep frying them. This beast is a different story, as the fillets are more like steaks. I cut the lateral lines out (the red meat) but tried not to waste the white meat and I probably got about 5lbs of meat if I had to guess. I took the fillets cut them into into 1"x1" peices and bagged up and am freezing what I don't plan on cooking tonight.

I know lots of guys eat big flatheads and blues and figured big channels must be just as good. And before anyone get's all uppity about this, it's a private lake I caught it at and the fella simply wants all his catfish gone. Zip, zilch, none they're just competeing to much with his other sportfish. And there are a lot of these big boys at my disposal so I'm just hoping there's a way to cook'em and still taste great. So instead of letting it go to waste, I'm gonna make a few meals out of it 

From what I can gather looking around the net. People cook the big cats the same way they cook the little cats. Bread'em, fry'em, enjoy'em. Any imput?

Thanks!


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## dinkbuster1 (Oct 28, 2005)

big channels tend to get tough but are still very tasty. i rarely ever eat any over 10lb but when i do i make sure to "tenderize" them before i fry or bake them. get you a sharp, or better yet a serated knife and stab the filets repeatedly like a serial killer on crank (  ) for about 3 minutes each. you will know how tough they are as you stab them. also, i find the male channel cats are way more tougher and have a less favorable taste so i never eat them anymore. my favorite ways to cook big filets is to first cut them into "strips" laterally, season with lemmon pepper (or soul seasoning), and either bake or roll in corn meal and fry in a skillet. man i'm gettin hungry thinking about it, time to go on a "meat hunt".


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## Fishman (Apr 5, 2004)

Breaded'em with some cajun seasonings, fried'em, and ate'em with some hash browns and a cold beer - was excellant!

Admittedly I was a bit hesitant taking the first bite seeing how large the fish was and was afriad it would taste bad, but I was wrong!


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## dinkbuster1 (Oct 28, 2005)

so long as you get that "red meat" out and tenderize them (if needed) they are just as good as the small ones, if not better.


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## Flathead King 06 (Feb 26, 2006)

also to help with the "fishy" taste...soak your fillets in salt water over night and then about 10 minutes before you fix it...put it in a bowl of water with a cap full of vinegar and soak it in that then rinse it off and roll it in your batter or whatever you plan on fixing it in...this really helps out with the oily/fishy tatse in all fish, but especially cats, and as dink already said...get rid of all the red meat which also takes alot of the bad taste out of the fish...just fixed a small flathead that way...just rolled it in cornmeal and flour with salt and pepper to taste


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## Webman27 (May 31, 2007)

another trick i have heard is to soak fish in milk to get the fishiness out of them


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## Fishman (Apr 5, 2004)

Thanks for the tips guys, I may try it a different way next time I thaw some out. It wasn't fishy tasting at all, basically just a huge farm raised channel ( they hang out infront of the pellet feeder all day)


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## Flathead King 06 (Feb 26, 2006)

Fishman said:


> ... they hang out infront of the pellet feeder all day


Come on now...thats not fishing  ...take 'em anyway you can get 'em sometimes...lazy man's fishing lol!!!


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## Fishman (Apr 5, 2004)

The guy wants'em gone and trust me they we're actually pretty difficult to catch. 30 or 40 of them in front of the feeder when I arived, catch one fish and they all disappeared. The lake has about 15 foot clarity and is 50 acres +. Ya the first fish was easy to catch, but the other ones really really hard (we didn't catch any other ones  )


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## Flathead King 06 (Feb 26, 2006)

sounds like a great place...and im just kidding...I know how hard it can be to catch them from a feeder...a buddy of mine has a 13 acre pond and he feeds them those floating pellets inside of a big "hoola-hoop" that sits on top of the water and boy...when tose pellets hit the surface...they wont bite nothing but those pellets...


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## dinkbuster1 (Oct 28, 2005)

private pond?..... he wants 'em gone?...... they taste good?...... BEER?.......... cast net, spear, electroshock, dynamite, whatever it takes to make the man happy! if you need help i have a 25ft seine


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## H2O Mellon (Apr 5, 2004)

MEAT HUNTER!!!!!

Just kidding Misfit


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## Fishman (Apr 5, 2004)

I've fished cats before from pellet feeders and it was really easy. I think its the severe water clarity to be perfectly honest. The majority of these channels are 10lbs + and would decimate a cast net if ya could even get it over'em.

Brian, meat hunting indeed. He asked me to remove the channels and all the crappie I could muster  Looking forward to it in the fall, gonna be a blast for crappies.


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