 I could reach out and touch this guy. Hey, buddy All back to the channel everybody We're on the crusade today. You guys watch the last video, you know them. I Was using one of my original fishing poles Actually got it with me right here, and I stumbled upon a lot of bluegill up shallow I was like, man, I really want to just grab a cooler and fill it up with gills Do a little catching cook and there's a creek up here on this lake I've never gone up and fished and it is hairy So I got the crispy collector out and I'm just idling through some stumpy areas right now This is a place that I would not take my bass boat. I've already hit a couple of stumps another hot Texas day Good day to be in the creek You know, it's the middle of summer when you're just here and Cicadas and all sorts of bugs up in these trees. They just sing all day in the heat. Just like But you got a fight you got to resist So we got our cork. We got our little stuff frostbite ice jig Actually, and then I've got a croppy nibble on there this is gonna be more of a just a morsel out there for them And get a paddle in action here. Oh, is there not just Gil city up under here well fishing freaks I have tried and I've tried and I've tried up run up miles up in this river Sitting here under a big tree right now And I've tied on another rig a little clear cork fly rig on a spinning rod Nothing only thing I see up here is gar and shad there might even be some bass up here There's a lot of laydowns and good-looking banks and stuff. It's unbelievable how I'm not seeing the gills And the other day I was in my vast boat just in you know, the part parts of the main lake Just so sad. I was I had dreams of taking the crispy and getting in these creeks and they were gonna be loaded But I think we're gonna have to just take our little boat and head back to the main waters But I've got a cooler that needs filling so let's get to work Ladies and gentlemen, look how big this gar is right here Just a jagoon to Swimming at the surface You know I could reach out and touch this guy Hey, buddy. Oh my gosh. He's gonna freak out when he hits the boat No, he's not look at him. Oh my god. I touched him. I touched him He's huge What in the world? Oh Man, I'll be so cool to catch that dude. I think he's trying to eat something. What are you trying to eat, man? Gosh, he's like hanging with me He's hanging with me I'm one. I'm one with the fish I've never seen anything like this What is going on buddy? He's hanging out with the motor. He's just It's like he likes the Is he trying to get oxygen? I don't even know This is the strangest thing y'all. He's literally just Hanging with the boat. I've seen so many gar rolling I'm wondering if he's like just low on oxygen But why would he hang close to the boat? Like he's just hanging near the boat like it's a big gar friend of his or something so confused Dude What in the world? I'm touch I'm holding the gar. I'm hold I got him. I got him. I'm petting him I'm petting the dagum gar y'all It's like he likes it on earth Like I've got him. I'm just holding him still Hey, buddy He's like a dinosaur, man This is crazy Like he looks healthy There you go, buddy Just kick it He just went under He just went under and swam off like a normal gar wood That is one of the strangest things I've ever seen In freshwater fishing like just coming up to a gar that size Nothing's wrong with it. Like it's not sick or anything. Maybe it ate something really big And it was trying to digest it. I I don't know But I've just seen tons of these gar today surfacing And man, wouldn't that be cool to catch one like a spotted gar that size on a rod and reel pretty awesome I would smash the like button for for taming a gar. I feel like that's what I just did Turok dinosaur tamer, you know remember that game? Okay back to my gill strategy. That was pretty awesome Coming up on another oddity a freaking huge blue catfish In heaven, look how big that thing is Wow We've traveled far now it is time for the nibbles See what this gets us Oh one's got it already. What the hell wasn't even looking Oh nibbin nibbin They might need a little something on there But hey, guess what this one's going in. You know fish is small when you get just one hand the whole situation, but That's why they come in numbers Get us like a maybe a 12 pack McNugget or I don't know. Maybe a 36 pack This is insane how many more fish are sitting up here Than there were where I was up in the creek where they should be Oh, okay. Now that one comes up and gets it Wabam got him Wabam A little bigger. Y'all these are so tasty. They're they're almost like eating Well, they're way better needing crawfish in terms of like You know getting meat out of them And cleaning them, but I want to try a new new way of doing this here today Oh my I mean the nibble is domination so for those that are curious these are Croppy nipples you can get them Just about everywhere you get your tackle I honestly never really use them for croppy. I always use them for uh for gills instead I mainly fish for croppy with jigs and they Usually eat the plastic just fine Gotta be one right here on this little corner Stuck him. Oh, I'm just got some fight. That's a biggin. There we go That's what I'm talking about That is a respectable size gill That's gonna be a tasty one Good There we go Going on a good one off that piece of brush It's a tasty eater This should be money Oh, yeah watch to meet it. Wow, bam Good y'all it is just A nitro scorcher out here. So I'm gonna head in And start to clean these gills. I've got enough. I'm no longer mad at them. That's for sure. We got plenty Fast forward a little bit and we have got our cooler full of gills y'all so I ended up catching three decent size ones And then I've got just a bunch of little ones so so what I'm going to do on a couple of these I'm just going to fillet them normally like I normally would And it's tedious. It's processed to get a really sharp knife fillet these off the bone off the rib cage But I've never tried Like a trout method where you basically just take the head and guts And take that off and then you cook the whole thing, but I'm going to de-scale it So I'll de-scale it and then take the guts out And then just cook it. I'm going to pan fry those in an iron skillet like shoreline style And I think they're going to be delicious, but I've never tried them with With the crispy skin and and tail and everything like that. So if you were in like a camping scenario Or just any kind of like Woods hiking whatever if you wanted to carry a little cane pole and then little jigs and stuff like that This would be an excellent way To just get yourself some some good protein out there in the woods cook it up easily fast And get the most out of it instead of having a fillet But let's go through both and then let's throw them in the skillet and compare this tailgate right here y'all On the new truck has no scales on it. So this is going to be the first time I'm cleaning fish Uh, I honestly really like using the tailgate. I kind of wish I had like a cleaning station at table But this this works just fine. It's at the perfect height too. Also, I'm going to be using Uh my really nice fillet knife that I got uh up on our upper king When me and matt filmed unthawed the great northern dangle I got him a knife and I also got myself a knife And I just really thought these these would be really cool knives. They have a back A back blade on them a back edge Which is it feels like it's about a 40 degree like it's got a much stronger Less sharp you could say like more for doing heavy work So I'm going to use that for descaling the front end which is probably a 20 degree Is really really sharp and that's what you do your filleting with anyways y'all I love and appreciate good knives. I like using them and this is going to be a perfect job for it. So Let's get to cracking on them start off with one of these good-sized ones here This is going to be just a normal fillet. I'm going to do this normally takes a little bit longer This is what you strive for right here. So you're trying to get them big ins right there You can get some actual meat off of them and then you can fillet them off the side a little fish head in there a little clamp I really like using this board to Just makes it easier when I'm cleaning all sorts of fish. I usually keep it in my in my truck I'm just going to go behind that little dorsal right there. I'm going to be careful not to cut all the way through Then we're just going to go to the side. I actually like to Pivot these So I tend to do a little bit better going this way. We're just going to cut down that This little spine right there Same way you would any other fish The gill you really want to try to make sure you're You're getting as close as you can. You're not wasting any meat So there's not much to begin with it's pretty close right there And then once you get past that rib cage, you can go all the way through And then you can just work it like that Through that skin And then just flip that over when you're cutting through that rib cage right there Once you get to the end of it, that's when you really want to turn your knife A lot of times you can miss that little piece of meat when I'm using a A regular filet knife like this Instead of electric I can feel a little bit better and it's just easier to get more meat. So You know, I like I like using these regular knives for stuff like this if you're not You don't have to clean a ton Especially little stuff Just do a really clean job. So that is a beautiful piece of meat right there. That's going to be delicious Nice little filet throw that in the fryer for like a minute And that's good to go So I've done two gills two of the biggest gills filet style and I want to do this one a different way So I'm actually going to do this like a trout See if I can just cut through here with this 40 degree end. So right here is where I'm getting stuck. I'm getting stuck on that that middle Spine makes me a little bit nervous Taking this edge and run it through here. I don't want to cut my fingers or anything I'm going to actually grab a little bit bigger blade Okay, this ought to do it. This is a knife. I typically use around camp That's a six inch with uh 10 95 steel this one right here is really made like Literally made for chopping through Wood you can use it as kind of almost like an axe So and it's very sharp So that just goes right through there And this whole thing is 40 degrees. So it's really meant for that type of Rough cutting. You don't want to really dull your filet knife It's for really precise cuts So now we have our headless gutless skill And I'm actually going to scale it. So I'm just going to put the tail end Right in here We'll take our back edge We're just going to scrape And scales are going to go everywhere So here is alternative to this is what I really wanted to try the guts are out of there heads off And that is ready to be breaded And throw in a hot pan of grease So scales are gone as well scraped all those off Now I wanted to do it on a big one as like a large example But where this is really useful is on those small ones because This is going to be more of a pain to eat obviously You've got the rib bones in there and everything you're going to have to pick around that But you're just getting a lot more meat off the fish So we've only got a few more left pretty close to being done And one of the things that I'm doing with the females that I'm getting I take I'm taking the rows or little Bluegill row or small But the chickens absolutely love these and then the other thing that I'm doing is I'm going to take the heads and the entrails I'm going to use the entrails just as Bait like attract it and then I'm going to use the heads as actual bait For some of my jug lines for catfishing because catfish love Bluegill so circle of life here. Which chicken is bold enough to step up to the plate? I mean they just One of the layers. There you go Right over it. We got our bluegill in the refrigerator osg is making up a batter right now I just want to give you all a quick knife care tip So I always hone my knives after I get done processing Game or whatever just using it and if you guys don't know how to hone your knives There's a bunch of youtube videos. I'll show you how to do it I just take a simple ceramic rod and I'll just run the blade down there and I'll get the get the edge back You're really not sharpening your knife Unless you damage it like you go through a heavy bone On a filet knife say and you've chipped a piece or you know, there's a dent in it or something Really the tip I want to give you is when you get done doing that Use olive oil on your steels. So a lot of steels, especially carbon steel You need to keep the steel lubricated in order to prevent it from rusting So worst thing in the world is to break out your knife. It's dull and it's rusting So what you want to do to prevent rust and keep all your knives in really good shape is use some olive oil And there's other products out there you can use and in fact I use them on some of my like straight up camp knives Or really nice knives that I'm not going to be using for process and game But for the ones that I'm using that basically I'm going to cut the stuff up and put it in my mouth I don't want to use any chemicals. So I use olive oil and it's actually a really great lubricant So I'll just take a little bit of olive oil Rub it on the blade with my finger Obviously be careful not to cut yourself But put it on the cutting edge put it on the The spine everywhere basically and you can even put it on the wood And it's even great for the sheath to hydrates the leathers, you know a lot of organic material in here wood leather And the even the steel has pores in it and this helps fill those pores keep them hydrated And it prevents rust from occurring and then hey if you want to cut up a fish frat put it in your mouth You don't have any chemicals in there. You want to break out your knife cut up an apple You know you're using olive oil. So it's just a natural oil. That's harm harmless So hone this drop your eyes after you get done using them slap some olive oil on there And they're going to be rust free and sharp for the rest of your life Devin's got the grease hot and we have fresh farm to market farm to table market to table market to table zucchini Which y'all my favorite side of all time Your mom does a much better job than I do my mom used to make fried squash all the time We do fried chicken with fried squash. We do fried squash with Fish a lot of times. I love it. I can eat like two whole squashes if they're fried just Gold crispies. They're like a little miniature of them crispies. Love them so much We're going to do the fish the same way as we're doing the squash, but I've got a some somebody sent in something to enhance The golden crispy experience. So I'm going to go grab it from downstairs. It looks like a pretty cool toy So this is a collapsible batter bowl This is made by Game maker y'all are interested. So to add a little spice We're going to put some texas feet in here with what is already in there, babe? It is one cup of milk and two eggs You went hard I like my gills a little spicy Stir that in Now I'm going to show you how this works. I'm going to add our AP flour All-purpose flour. I believe that sounds work We'll go four scoops I guess Throw a little bit of cornmeal in there You want to try one of these? Now we add our fish. I'm just going to place these in the flour Fish, Amy Yeah Mess that's correct Put this on here Put this on top You've got to shake it before you bake it Shake a break I'm going to flip it over And those little holes And this is going to allow the flour to go to the other side and then I can reuse it And we are left with some floured gills Put that up and you got fresh flour at the bottom now for the moment. We've all been waiting for We're going to take our gills over to the grease. We just got our zucchini A little pinch of salt A little pinch of black pepper to finish it off Whole gill Except the head Wop-a-am It's a smooth grease Let's keep adding them. There's a special sound right there This has been about two and a half, three minutes I think they're done They're looking golden That's kind of sad-looking Little Nemo's I know I almost showed Amy Your bucket of fish? I was like, maybe I shouldn't Yeah, because they really look like fish This would actually be a really fun thing for Amy to do Because it is a very simple technique It is easy There wasn't any treble hooks involved. This is something we could do as a family And rake them up Rake them all in the first batch and go to the crispies Okay, fish and freaks Let's try some gills. I think they fried up really nice I wish you did a good job On the batter and the zucchini, my gosh I'm telling you, I could just down three or four zucchinis if they're fried like this. They're amazing Cold adult beverage of your choice This whole situation, mm. I'm curious though How this is going to break down? So we got skin on No scales. We've got these spiny rays up here. I want to see if I can pull these out maybe These will just pull out. Okay, so I'm going to break apart that top. Oh, that looks cooked perfectly So I've got it cooked just right where it'll just fall apart So we kept the spiny rays up there so you could just pull them out Eat them like that Obviously don't eat the spines, but you can really pick this thing apart. I mean if you're sitting Sitting at the camp. You got a ton of time Nothing to do but look at nature Pick it apart You're definitely going to get the most most meat off this I can already tell. Let's get to the main chunk Okay, so this is going to be some rib cage in here So I'm just going to hold it like this and eat it Man, I'm just going to go for it. Oh man That works out really nice y'all. Wow. Look at that You just take a bite out of the back And just left clean like that. Oh my goodness. You're getting so much more meat this way All right, let me take a look at this little side side unit here I'm just going to take my teeth and kind of go across the rib cage Yeah, no, that's not working out on the rib cage. That's always the part But you're gonna have trouble with trying to get meat off of you can actually If you want to sit here and take all these little rib bones out and you'll get little little morsels of meat like that I compared it to crawdads earlier, but it's way more than a crawfish. You can clean that rib cage Sure did. Wow That's just a fried piece right there. Okay, now I'm going to go The back tail part of the fish here comes off nicely Here's the tail. If you really wanted to get some extra calcium You could probably just go ahead and eat the fins too, but go ahead and peel this one last little section off That is what we're left with eating it this way one little tiny piece of meat right there Pull that off That is just awesome Bluegill are so good. They're tedious, you know, I have some of the filets Let's grab one of those just for reference real quick. So here is our regular filet. This is off one of the bigger ones Cook to perfection Not you just throwing your mouth And it's amazing super white just fantastic meat on fantastic meat on these gills. Ooh Got a little bite on that Texas Pete. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I know Amy it is so good It's so good better not look over here because Nemo basically was uh disemboweled pretty hard. I have a new perspective on bluegill now as a food source Um pretty amazing. They are widespread across the u.s. They're probably the the easiest to catch and in terms of like just easy to catch and great taste Uh, one of the best fish that you can get and they're accessible throughout the united states And one of the really cool things about them is they are aggressive in the summer There's a reason they call them sunfish. So if you want to go out have some fun catch some gills Don't forget to clean them up try this way And I think you're gonna find that there it's almost like eating fried chicken There's a little bit more work, but there's a lot that comes on them until the next fishing adventure y'all I'm wishing you the best and all of your dangles bon appetit. And I'll see y'all