Ricky Richoux has strong opinions about the right way to handle fish to get a quality product for the table.
For one thing he rinses often.
He hoses his work area before he starts. He hoses the fish after he takes them out of the ice chest. He hoses his gloves and the cleaning surface often during filleting to keep the stomach juices away from the flesh. This is especially important for big fish, he explains. He hoses the fillets before packing them in plastic bags. Then he hoses the area again before the next batch. He will even hose the deck several times during a job.
“Water is cheap. I use a lot of it,” he explains with no apologies.
Also, he never takes more than 25 trout out of the ice chest for cleaning at one time to keep them from warming up. If he has a lot of fish, he cleans them in batches. This is especially important for white trout, which are soft-fleshed to begin with.
“You have to go slow and easy filleting them,” he says, “so it really helps if they are cold.”
He wishes that everyone took time to ice their fish well. Ice needs to be on top of the fish as well as under them.
Cleaned fish are carefully separated by species. White trout go on one pile, specks on another, and so forth. After washing, they are put in separate zipper-type plastic bags, labeled according to species.
Immediately after bagging, Richoux buries the bags completely in ice.
