Recipe - Grilled Black Sea Bass

This is my favorite Sea Bass recipe:

4 whole Black Sea Bass (about 3/4 to 1 pound each) - cleaned, rinsed and dried
4 garlic cloves, chopped
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
1/4 cup sesame oil
1/3 cup tamari soy sauce
6 thin slices of fresh ginger, cut into thin strips
4 sprigs fresh cilantro, roughly chopped
4 thinly sliced green onions

Make 2 slashes about 1/2" deep on each side of the fish. Place them flat in a single layer in a glass dish. Combine all the other ingredients, whisk well and then pour over the fish. Let the fish marinate for 30 minutes or more at room temp, turning once after 15 minutes.

Place the fish in a hinged wire basket for ease of turning. Place over a med-hot grill and sear on one side for 2 minutes, then continue to cook further away from the heat until that side is done. Turn the fish over, spoon some of the marinade onto the cooked side and repeat the searing and cooking process for the other side.

Serve with the remaining marinade on the side.

This recipe will also work well for Striped Bass, grouper or other firm white fish, whole or fillets.

Fishing Report - January 28, 2006

Jan 28, 2006 6:45am - 2:30pm
Tide: High at 6:18 am; Low at 1:26 pm
Water Temp: 52 degrees
Air Temp: 27-63 degrees
Moon: New Moon
Location: AR362 & AR366
Pressure: 30.54
Wind: Calm
Sky: Sunny
Fish Caught: 30+ Black Sea Bass (kept 20); 5 Grouper (kept 2) 1 Tautog
Biggest: BSB - 14"; Grouper - 24"

Wow - What an awesome day for the end of January. While it started out cold (was 27 degrees at 6:30am when we left) it warmed up with lots of sunshine and almost no wind! Seas were mild at 1-2 feet with no chop in the AM and just a touch on the way back in in the afternoon.

Fishing was great too. We headed out to some of the ledges 4-5 miles off Topsail Inlet, didn't see much activity on the bottom so we headed out to the first set of Box cars (AR362). We caught a limit of Black Bass (20) in about an hour and a half then the sharks started biting. After the fourth one we decided to try AR366. We got there and fished a couple of spots before we hooked up with a grouper! We ended up catching 5 groupers but only 2 of them were legal size and those just barely. But hey, catching grouper on a medium action 7' rod with 10 pound test is FUN.

We caught a few more Black Bass (working on the second limit as there was two of us on the boat). Also the boat next to us caught a very nice size Silver Snapper.

Excellent January Fishing!

Upcoming Saturday fishing trip

For two weeks I've been plotting and planning to go Striper fishing in the Cape Fear River around Wilmington. The tides, the solunar and other factors all lined up for what looked like a great afternoon of fishing. Then it was just a matter of hoping the weather would hold out.

As it turns out, the weather forecast for tommorrow looks great. In fact TOO good to miss an opportunity to go off shore and do some bottom fishing! Sorry Stripers, you will have to wait. We don't get many winter days that a small boat like mine can get out far enough to bottom fish so one has to pounce given the opportunity.

I'll let you know how we make out.

Fishing Report - January 21, 2006

Jan 21, 2006 11:00am - 1:30pm
Tide: High at 11:54pm
Water Temp: 53 degrees
Air Temp: 68 degrees
Location: South Topsail area
Wind: 10-15mph, SW
Sky: Overcast
Fish Caught: 0

What a beautiful day for the third week of January! Didn't catch any fish but I did enjoy a few hours on the water. I fished the tide change at flood tide which often provides a good Speck bite but not today.

On another note, the Bluefin Tuna bite in Southern NC has been awesome this past week or so. I heard reports of 5 being caught yesterday. I haven't heard a number for today but a buddy of mine did report a catch of a 500+ pound fish off of The Horseshoe today! He fought the fish for over 5 hours and then once he got it to the boat, it took them an hour to get the 90" fish into the boat.

Tight lines to ya!

GPS

I own a Garmin GPSMAP 178C and have been satisified with it. Then I decided to try the Blue Charts with it. As I already owned the Flashcard reader/burner and I wanted to manage the maps and waypoints with my computer, I went with the CD-Rom version instead of the chip. Wow - it is wonderful. I easily imported my waypoints, tracks and routes that I had previousely stored and now I have good maps to visualize them on. You need to be careful with them though, they are not 100% acurate as the shoals and sand move around esp. when a storm passes through.

Then I discovered that I could export my data to Google Map - Wow - now that is powerful. Of course I can't get the Google images into my GPS unit but still, it is very useful.

I love technology, esp. those that help me enjoy my hobbies!

Sabiki rigs

We are having a discussion over at NCAngler.com regarding bait techniques. I posted one regarding Sabiki rigs so I thought I'd post it here as well.

I often use a eight foot long 5/8" mesh cast net for catching Menhaden to use as bait when King fishing. But sometimes they are not available or I run out or whatever. So I keep a light tackle rig on board and a sibiki rig or two in the tackle box and use them to jig up bait from the bottom.

A Sabiki rig has anywhere from 6-10 hooks, usually gold and spaced out on a three to six foot leader with a swivel at the top and a snap at the bottom to attach a pyramid weight. Usually wherever you are King fishing there will be some hard bottom or reefs nearby (or on the way), locate them with your GPS & fishfinder and then drop the sabiki rig straight down (a 3 ounce weight is best, if you go lighter your line will tangle). Once it hits the bottom just jig it up and down about a foot or so, pretty quick you will feel the fish on the end, reel it up and be prepared for mulitple fish at a time - cigar minnows, ribbonfish, greenies, etc. Often I can fill my bait well in about 10 minutes or less.

Some guys I know make their own but I prefer the Hayabusa brand Sabiki in either size 6 or 8 with a red or green bead above each hook and a dried fish skin sheath on the hook shank. I always have some aboard in case I need extra bait or can't find menhaden.

Happy New Year

Today was the last day of my extended time off for the Holidays and I had hoped to get one more day of fishing in but the weather had other plans. It was windy, rainy and some occasional thunder boomers mixed in so my boat stayed in the driveway.

Overall December was a pretty good fishing month considering it's the start of the winter season. The trout have been biting all month, slower at the end but not too bad. Drum are still hot, esp. when we get a sunny day, they can be found in the shallow mud flats.

My new light, fast, sensitive Trout rig I bought at the end of November is working out great! It's a Shimano Compre 7' 0" Spinning Rod with a Shimano Stradic 2500FH spun up with Power Pro braid.

Happy New Year to All!!!!