Journal of a Minnesota Angler

I’ve never been a big fan of Northern Pike. I’m not really a catch-and-release fisherman (except when it comes to muskie), so I like to eat what I catch. But Northern aren’t what I would call a delicacy. Their many, many tiny bones and fishy smell make them one of the less desirable species I like to put on the table.

But recently, I heard about pickling them. As an adult, I became a fan of pickled herring during the holidays, so pickled Northern Pike sounded like a natural variation. I learned of this from our neighbor and he sent us a recipe. The next few posts will document our grand experiment.

The great thing about this process is that if it works out, I’ll have a good excuse to pull out all those nasty Northern in my father-in-law’s lake. The DNR has been stocking his lake with Walleye and Lake Trout fingerlings, but the Walleye are few and far between while no one has pulled a Lake Trout out of the lake yet. We think the Northern might be finding a smorgasboard.

The first step of our recipe consisted of the following:

Cut 60 to 75 bite size pieces of fish
One cup of non-iodized salt to 1 gallon jar 1/2 full of water
Add fish until jar is full
Let stand for 48 hours

My wife defrosted our bounty from this summer and started cutting up the fillets into chunks. Thanx partly due to the 27″ monster I caught at the end of the trip, we ended up with enough fish to do a batch and a half.

Cutting the fillets into chunks.

The overflow.

Full batch in the brine.

We put the concoction in the fridge and now we wait. See you in two days.

More From MNAngler

• Pickled Northern – The Result
• Pickled Northern – Step 2
• Pickled Northern Pike Recipe

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