Eating fresh fish and game is the best part of hunting and fishing, but proper processing is the key to ensuring good flavor.
You can fill your freezer with delicious, highly nutritious fish and game that was fed from nature’s pantry, but freezing is a tricky and inexact science. Carelessly packed meat invites freezer burn and deterioration, but doing it right ensures that the fruits of your days afield will remain fresh and palatable for years, if necessary.
Success starts at the point of impact, so to speak. Handling fish is fairly easy. Keep them alive until you are ready to clean them if possible. If you don’t have a livewell that’s big enough, put your fish on ice immediately. That inhibits deterioration, and it will keep the flesh firm.
If you don’t plan on eating your fillets right away, you’ll have to freeze them. Unfortunately, fish is delicate and vulnerable to freezer burn and other assaults that will damage texture and flavor.
Case in point was a mess of mahi-mahi and yellowfin tuna I caught off the Delaware coast about this time several years ago. Right out of the water, it was the most delicious fish I have eaten.
Despite our best efforts to prep the fish for freezing, it wasn’t so good later. Grilling and frying produced a rancid odor that probably made the fillets and steaks taste fishier than they really were. Nevertheless, the delayed experience wasn’t nearly as delightful as when fresh. That was a disservice to the fish, and that disappointed me as much as anything.
A vacuum sealer solves that problem. As the name suggests, it creates an airtight, moistureproof storage compartment that preserves meat for years.
I use a unit from FoodSaver called the GameSaver Titanium, which includes a large capacity vacuum sealer and a 15-minute marinator.
The machine is easy to use. My daughters enjoyed packing away the season’s first venison in a fun father-daughter event. It’s also instructive for children to help convert a deer to food.
Processing the meat is the most important step, of course, and the the most labor intensive. I spent considerable effort removing white tissue, trimming edges, shaping roasts and carving steaks.
After that, the girls stuffed the meat into vacuum bags and sealed them. They used preformed bags, but they also created bags from sheets.
Doing that is quick and simple. The sheet is in two layers, so unroll an appropriate size sheet and seal one end. For that, place the edge of the sheet on the heat element, lower the lid onto the sheet, lock it and press the start button. The light turns green when the seal is complete.
A built-in cutter slices the sheet from the roll without leaving so much as a burr.
Pack meat into the bag, leaving about 3 inches of space between the meat and the open edge of the bag. Place the open end on the heating element, lower the lid, lock the lid and press the button.
The dual pumps remove all the air out of the bag and pull blood and water from the meat. When the seal is complete, the light turns green. It takes about 30 seconds to make a complete vacuum pack.
Label the bag and place it in the freezer.
Steve C. Wilson, the national sales manager for JCS USA, said he spent 11 years fine-tuning the design of the GameSaver Titanium. He said it is the most modern and most advanced unit of its kind.
“I found some elk meat in my freezer marked on the wrap from Sept. of 2006,” Wilson wrote in an e-mail. “I had taken it to the butcher to be processed. He wrapped it in plastic wrap then butcher wrap and when I got it home I tossed it in a vacuum bag. I opened it and cooked it last week. Ten years later, and it was perfect. Not a sight of freezer burn, and it tasted great!! I have been working with this product for 15 years, and even I was impressed as this is the longest I have ever not eaten something I had killed.”
The 15-minute marinator also works by vacuum. Place the meat and marinade in the unit and activate. The vacuum opens the meat grain and allows the marinade to saturate the meat in 15 minutes as opposed to hours or days.
Depending on the retailer, the GameSaver Titanium costs from $315-$450. Comparable units are available from Bass Pro Shops and Cabela’s.