# Butterfly Perch



## Fishindude (May 19, 2015)

The lake where our cottage is in northern Michigan is loaded with small perch. We catch a lot and always just throw them back. Recently a friend showed me a youtube video on how to butterfly clean perch, so we gave it a shot last weekend on about 25. It's kind of a tedious method on the small perch, but they sure turned out nice and are very tasty.

I suspect we will be keeping a few more of these guys in the future.


----------



## fishhead (Jul 19, 2006)

Where's the link to the video?


----------



## StL.Ed (Mar 6, 2011)

And here, I thought this was a Butterfly Perch...


----------



## Fishindude (May 19, 2015)

fishhead said:


> Where's the link to the video?


Here is one, there are many on line.


----------



## fishhead (Jul 19, 2006)

Thanks.

I was snorkeling last week and saw a bunch of 3" bluegills and some 4-5" perch. That got me thinking about butterfly filleting again.

I would leave the rib cage in place and just split them on one side of the dorsal fin like salmon that are cut for drying.

I'm thinking that it might soften the bones but if not they should lift out pretty easily although it would make it harder to bread them. We ran a bunch of small bass through the blender and then fried them. They made little green patties and the bones were just as hard plus there were now more of them.


----------



## Homesteader at Heart (Aug 11, 2003)

Why not just fillet them? It seems like it would be quicker than butterflying.


----------



## fishhead (Jul 19, 2006)

If they were larger than I probably could fillet them faster but these are small fish. Also, by the time you fillet the meat off the ribs it would only be about 1/8" thick.

I'm not sure why some people fillet the larger fish but I do know that processors butterfly perch so there must be a reason.


----------

