Although bony, the flesh is sweet and flaky. When coated with cornmeal and fried to a golden brown, they make excellent table fare. Because of the bones, pickerel are often ground and used in fishcakes. Here is a recipe for pickerel cakes: 1 cup skinned pickerel fillets 1/3 cup bread crumbs 1 teaspoon dried parsley 1/4 teaspoon basil 1/4 teaspoon thyme salt and pepper to taste juice of 1/2 lemon 1 green pepper 1 small onion
Grind the pickerel, green pepper, and onion. Place in bowl and mix in remaining ingredients. Form into patties and dredge with flour and fry until golden brown or save in freezer by separating cakes between strips of waxed paper.
Pickerel Photo Gallery
An air-hammer could do five times as much as someone with an ordinary chipping hammer. I longed for the day I would be trusted with one. The racket on the deck from so many hammers striking steel was enormous; an unholy deafening din that had to be heard to be believed. After the chippers came the brushers, scrubbing the freshly chipped metal bare with stiff wire brushes until it gleamed. I was less keen on wire-brushing; it was unsatisfying and harder on the arms, with less room for dreaming. After the brushers came the painters, slopping red lead paint over everything, using big deck rollers, loading up from long paint trays set on the deck beside them. The day started with everyone chipping – a phalanx of hand chippers working its way along the deck, flanked by four air chipping-hammers, two on either side. After lunch, the bosun dismissed two of the air hammers and moved a quarter of the hand chippers over to wire brushing. Following the mid-afternoon smoke, half the remaining chippers were also moved onto brushing, with a few starting to roll the paint. The brushers gradually caught up with the remaining chippers and then the painters caught up with the brushers.
