Something ugly, something delicious

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Something ugly, something delicious

Despite its appearance, toadfish makes for a tasty meal

The toadfish might not be pretty to look at, but prepared properly it can make a delicious meal. Mike Marsh/For the StarNews

To most anglers, an oyster toadfish is one of the ugliest and most annoying bait stealers they can see dangling at the end of the line. Until I met Jeseph Kaynor, nothing could dispel the old adage that says a toadfish must only be pretty to another toadfish. While I have heard a few other anglers say they are tasty on the table, Kaynor is the first one I have met who actually enjoys catching them because he likes to eat them.

I was fishing at one of the Masonboro Inlet jetties when I landed a toadfish. Jeseph was fishing with his five-year-old son, Baylen, in their 16-foot aluminum johnboat within shouting distance. Jeseph saw me unhooking a toadfish and hollered, asking me to keep the fish and not toss it back. So, before leaving the area to fish another spot, I gave him the fish and took down his telephone number to see if he would provide some perspective on toadfish as well as his recipe.

“We fish to eat,” said Jeseph, who is 34 and works with the Pender EMS and Fire Department. “I use a drum rig with a 6- to 10-ounce sinker and a No. 6 circle hook. We catch pinfish and pigfish on shrimp and use those smaller fish for bait for red drum, sea bass and other species. I live in Hampstead and we fish the jetties because it has good structure and it is a safe place to fish.”

While many other fishermen toss toadfish back, he keeps them. He put the toadfish in a bucket full of seawater and cooked them that night. While he said toadfish will stay alive as long as three days, he prefers to cook them immediately.

“I gut the toadfish and put it in a saucepan with 1/2-inch to 3/4-inch of water,” he said. “I put a cast-iron skillet on top to keep the toadfish from popping out and steam it for about five minutes, until the skin starts to peel back away from the eyes. I pour the hot water out of the pot and put cold water back in with the fish to cool it. Then I skin the fish with a fork, remove the meat from the bones and put it aside on a plate. A one-pound toadfish yields 6 to 10 ounces of meat.”

The meat is white, firm and dense. Many anglers eat blowfish, also called northern puffers, which have meat of similar flavor and texture. However, while the prime meat on fish that most anglers are familiar with is located on the tail and flanks, the choice meat is behind the eye and around the jaws of a toadfish, where the large muscles give the toadfish an incredibly powerful, crushing bite.

“The guys at work will fight over what I cook for them,” he said. “It is gourmet eating.”

Baylen is not quite the cook his father is, yet, and does not like to clean fish. Nevertheless, he enjoys going fishing.

“He likes to put meat on the table and eats any fish he catches,” Jeseph said. “He likes going if the fish are biting and if I don’t keep him out in the boat too long.”

Kaynor’s Toadfish Tacos

Meat: Steam toadfish for five minutes, skin the fish, separate the meat from the bones and set aside. Before serving, re-heat in a skillet with coconut oil and lime juice.

Stuffing: Make a salad of shaved cabbage adding salt, pepper, sugar and a liquid of half vinegar and half water. Salad should stand but not drain.

Stuffing flavor booster: In the cast-iron skillet, fry mushrooms and onions in coconut oil until browned.

Sauce: Prepare a Polynesian sauce of mayonnaise, water, limejuice and cilantro in a blender. Remove 85 percent of the sauce and place in a sauce bowl.

Hot sauce: Add habanero peppers and soy sauce to the remaining sauce in the blender and mix.

Garnish: Diced Mango.

Serving: Toast corn tortillas in the cast-iron skillet. Add meat, stuffing and sauces to taste. Mango counters the hot spiciness of habanero.

— For more outdoors news or to order one of Mike’s books, go to mikemarshoutdoors.com.

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