Striper season coming soon, who's ready?

My buddy (who'll be the best man in my wedding next year) grew up on the Cape with me and moved to Jersey almost 10 years ago. Don't really get to see him that much anymore but he came up for the holiday weekend. Brought him out to one of my favorite fishing spots Saturday evening, raked a bunch of fresh sand eels, and he caught a nice 38"er. He hadn't caught a keeper in many many years and he was elated. I got nothing (which is par for the course so far this season) but it made me happy to see how psyched he was. We brought it back to my house, grilled up half of it, got shit-faced and stayed up til 2a.m. laughing about the trouble we used to get into as young kids. [smile]
 
How do you cook stripers so they taste good? Every time I try to cook them they don't come out so I like them.
 
How do you cook stripers so they taste good? Every time I try to cook them they don't come out so I like them.

I have two different easy recipes. First one sounds weird but trust me, it's tasty:
Cover filets in Zesty Italian dressing and your favorite mustard. Throw it in tinfoil and put it on the grille over medium heat. Probably around 10 minutes per side depending on how thick the filets are.

This one is real yummy. This is copied from my saved emails of friends' recipes...

Take 1 sleeve of Ritz crackers and crush until dust

Next melt 1 stick of real butter

Finely chop 1/4-1/2 pound of bay scallops

Mix all ingredients together in bowl

Spread evenly on top of Bass filet

The mixture should be 3/8”-1/2” thick

Sprinkle a dash of garlic salt or your favorite spice on top of mixture

A splash of white wine if desired

Use tin foil to line bottom of oven pan and place filet. Do not cover filet.

Pre heat oven to 350

Bake in oven at 350 for 20-30 minutes until topping is golden brown

This recipe will usually service 1 large filet (32”-40” Striper)
 
See above, also trim off the red meat.

Lots of folks do that but I don't mind the dark stuff. I try to use as much of the fish as possible. I don't catch keepers that often. [wink]

Bluefish are a different story. Usually if I catch a Bluey I give it to my buddy who either smokes it, or makes pate.
 
How do you cook stripers so they taste good? Every time I try to cook them they don't come out so I like them.
I also use ritz crackers but mix them with bread crumbs, and some parmesan cheese. Dip filet in melted butter, a little lemon juice on top , cover filet top and bottom in the mix. I cook them in a baking pan but I use a cookie rack in the pan, this allows the top and bottom of the filet to keep the coating on it making a better crunchy type coating. You could add some italian seasoning to the mix prior to coating also, gives it extra flavor.
 
Can't freaking wait for the CT River striper run. So weird to be able to catch them in my bass boat, on the CT River, right near Sprinfgield.

Hopefully the local bait guy got his license back and will be able to sell live eels again.

Down here in Georgia we fish for stripers in many lakes, but Lake Lanier has the most and it is not unusual to catch 10 to twenty and if you are really lucky you might get one 40 plus pounds. They also sell rainbow trout for bait which stripers love.
 
I suck at this. Lost a good one in the Merrimack this morning. [sad2] I just gotta find time to do it more. I can only get schoolies. Never got a keeper from shore. I'll keep plugging away I guess
 
The heartbreak is what keeps you coming back..did you pull the hook? Knot or line fail?

Oh its completely my fault. There's some things I've played over in my head I could have done better. It was able to throw the hook, just a split second of slack as he went to my side (I was on a point). If there was light, I would've seen better to battle better. Actually I think, if I moved to it, I think it was only a few feet from the sand to my left. It wasn't many turns of the handle to retrieve the empty hook. [crying]. It's a mistake I wouldn't make fishing for anything else, but excitement took over concentration. The part I hate is that I've thought about it all day.....Damn it! It's turning into another obsessive hobby like hunting or the other types of fishing I do.
 
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