Thread: Are sheepshead good to eat?

I ran onto a guy on the old pier one day and asked him how the fishing was. He said it was great, he had never caught so many catfish in his life. I'm thinking he had some nice gaftops, until he opened the lid to his cooler to show me. That 48qt Igloo cooler was slap full of 6-10" hardhead catfish. He said he was having a fish fry for his family that week and wanted all of them he could get. I tried to tell him that the hardheads weren't like freshwater catfish, but he insisted that they tasted the same. I don't know how that fish fry turned out, but I'd bet nobody came to any future fish fries he hosted.

Originally Posted by spottedbass

Pinfish are good. I have eaten them. It is just hard to get one big enough to fool with.

I tried them once, had a strong iodine taste to me.
Back in the day, we occasionally caught 2-3 lb pinfish on the reefs offshore!
Never kept them.

Another name for pinfish is 'sailors's choice', so that gives you an indication of taste.

Actually, Sailor's Choice is a different fish: Haemulon parra, in the grunt/margate complex.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haemulon

I just happened to see that name in my old "A.J. McLains New Standard Fishing Encyclopedia" which I've had since back in the Seventies. ---Has actual pages in it.

The key to preparing most fish is cleaning them right away, cutting out the lateral line and putting the fillets on ice or refrigerating them. I like to cook them right up when I can! As for sheepshead - GREAT! I like pinfish and I haven't detected the "iodine" aftertaste that CarlF detected. It's just difficult to catch pinfish/grunts/pigfish big enough and I frankly don't enjoy fishing for them either but if I catch a big one it goes in the cooler. Remoras are great fried up, as are spadefish, slot reds, whiting, croakers, speckled trout, bluefish, hardtails, spanish mackerel, and sailcats. The qualifier about sailcats - you HAVE to get every speck of dark red lateral line off the fillet. I grill king mackerel, small black drum, pompano, BIG whiting, and flounder. I don't want to take a big black drum and waste it, so I turn them loose (though I haven't hooked one in years). I've tried hardhead catfish twice and I found them to leave a pasty aftertaste that was unappealing.

This year, I'm going to try SOMETHING new. I haven't decided what, yet. Maybe I'll fry up some "scaled sardines"!

Originally Posted by Haywire

I just happened to see that name in my old "A.J. McLains New Standard Fishing Encyclopedia" which I've had since back in the Seventies. ---Has actual pages in it.

Check out Mr. Wire goin 'old school interweb' on us ;-) LOL

Does the pope sh!t in the woods?

Yes, the bear is Catholic.

And wears a funny hat.

Originally Posted by eym_sirius

The key to preparing most fish is cleaning them right away, cutting out the lateral line and putting the fillets on ice or refrigerating them. I like to cook them right up when I can! As for sheepshead - GREAT! I like pinfish and I haven't detected the "iodine" aftertaste that CarlF detected. It's just difficult to catch pinfish/grunts/pigfish big enough and I frankly don't enjoy fishing for them either but if I catch a big one it goes in the cooler. Remoras are great fried up, as are spadefish, slot reds, whiting, croakers, speckled trout, bluefish, hardtails, spanish mackerel, and sailcats. The qualifier about sailcats - you HAVE to get every speck of dark red lateral line off the fillet. I grill king mackerel, small black drum, pompano, BIG whiting, and flounder. I don't want to take a big black drum and waste it, so I turn them loose (though I haven't hooked one in years). I've tried hardhead catfish twice and I found them to leave a pasty aftertaste that was unappealing.

This year, I'm going to try SOMETHING new. I haven't decided what, yet. Maybe I'll fry up some "scaled sardines"!

Jack Crevalle maybe?