It's Fishy Around Here

 Among other things, we have been doing FISH......FISH and more FISH here on Farrago Acres.

The weather quickly turned colder in the last week, too cold for the warm water Tilapia in our aquaponic/ barrelponic system.  Last year about this time we built a greenhouse and heated our tank in order to overwintered the fish. This year we decided that this option is to expensive, unless we create a more cost effective heating option. (We have considered building a rocket stove heated fish tank.  It theoretically sounds like a good plan.) Since our time right now is rather limited, our only other option seems to be Fish Harvesting.

Some of the fish were a bit smaller than we hoped.

Duane is awesome with this sort of thing.  Sometimes I actually think he really enjoys butchering.  I, on the other hand, dutifully help him.  Saturday afternoon Steve helped Duane out for a few hours and I certainly didn't complain.

  I have come a long way, but I still don't like meat processing all that well.  Fish is better than some things, mainly because it isn't warm, THAT is good.  But it still quivers and it is............well... it is still meat.  I might be a vegetarian if I hadn't married a MEAT lover. 

But I love to cook so in the end, not working with meats would actually crimp my style.   I am much happier working with already processed meat. Meat in it's supermarket form, nicely removed from the reality of what it is and where it's been and what it just ate last.

It's worth it though,  I LOVE the end results.  It is fabulous to prepare fish that was swimming just 20 min earlier.  It just doesn't get any fresher or closer to the source. I promise you can taste the difference.

 The end results were gratifying, 25 frozen meal size packs of Tilapia fillets and 14 quarts of canned fish stock - made from the heads and tails. 

Then of course, there are all the fish related meals we have eaten fresh during the last two weeks

Tilapia en Papillote w/fresh Rosemary and Butter Sauce

Fish Tacos with Wild Mushroom Rice

Tilapia Poached in White Wine with Fresh Herbs

Simple Cornmeal Encrusted Tilapia  Panfried in Butter

 and 2 gallons of stock that we also used fresh for

Asian Coconut Fish Soup

Tilapia Chowder - think Clam Chowder (sort of)

Wild Rice and Tilapia Soup

It is a good life, it really is!