how to cook fresh mackerel?????

ailuro2

Cut off the tail and fins, then flake the fish off the bones.

Though once I have put myself off something there's no way I'll change my mind - but at least the dogs won't choke on the fish bones once you're through preparing it.:rotfl:

BitterAndTwisted

I'd just cut off the head and grill it. If I was feeling lavish I'd give it a squeeze of lemon. Mackerel is delish.

CCP

It might be a bit late now but I've made that recipe and it's really tasty. I think I'd go with the suggestion of cutting off the head and tail, then cooking as in the recipe: as the other posters have said, mackerel bones lift out really easily when the fish is cooked so you shouldn't have any problems.

It won't be any oilier than smoked mackerel - probably less so, imo - and it's delicious with the devilled coating. I hope you decide(d) to try it but, if not, you've got some very lucky dogs!

JillS_2

If you've bought it whole you will need to gut it. (Not as bad as it sounds and dead easy). After cutting off head, tail, and fins, slit open along the belly and pull/ scrape/ wash out the messy stuff.

Ida_Notion

This thread reminded me so much of when I bought a couple of mackerel a year or so after I'd left home. I'd been buying frozen mackerel fillets of the non-smoked variety for a while from the local freezer centre, but they stopped doing them and so I hesitantly decided that I'd buy some fresh whole mackerel instead. All afternoon I agonised about sticking a knife into them and pulling the guts out, but in the end I just could not bring myself to do it (and probably still couldn't today). I didn't even have a dog, and so the only place for them was the bin. Thirty years on and the waste - as well as my own lack of bottle in the fish gutting department - still bothers me.

Reading JillS's post it made me think that it would be interesting to see the process on video, just to see if fish innards are as icky as I imagine them to be, so I looked on Youtube and found the following, which might be helpful...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iy9qAlUBtE

Am not sure if we are allowed to post links or not, so if the forum software strips the link out just search Youtube for 'gutting mackerel'. The one I looked at was the first one, called 'How To Gut A Mackerel', and just before the end the bloke demonstrates in a bit of a yuksome way that he is far more fond of mackerel than I ever was, but before that you can see the gutting process pretty clearly.

bluebag

Aghh, not if I was dying!!!!:(

zippychick

as this has dropped down the board, ive merged it with our fresh mackerel thread

ZIP