Thats a nice bunch ! Hot skillet here we come

Here on the lower Yukon River Pike are not eaten during the summer by most folks. Kind of considered a trash fish. We have better choices of fish at that time. But starting in March they are fished through the ice mostly by women right up until breakup in May. They then, butterfly fillet the fish and hang them to dry, to later be eaten dipped in seal oil.

When the women fillet them they have no bones. They cut them thin leaving the skin on, when they are done there is only a inch thickness of dried meat on the skin, so it drys in the subzero temps faster. It looks like a lot of waste left on the carcass but its no big deal and the backbones go to the dogs.

The men traditionally bring the dried pike as grub on spring goose hunts. We eat them in the blind for lunch while waiting for birds.

I do like pike fried and will fillet out the lower sections that don't have any bones and fry it with skin and scales on,( scaling a fish makes the meat mushy I never do it.) I fry the meat side first and flip to the skin/scale side. Ahd once its done you can lift the fillet right up of the skin and the skin is left in the pan.

I won't keep them under 24" and that's pushing it. Just too much wasted on any fish smaller than that. It's my wifes favorite fish when dipped in butter like lobster.

The way I do it there is no waste even on small ones.
Thing with small ones,the butterflyed backs where the y bones come out the pieces are thin and its like eating potato chips if you cook them a tad too long.

The lake I have my cabin on allows you to keep any pike under 30 inches. I like them between 25-28 inches for eating.
I use the way most people take the Y bones out that you find on You Tube. The key is practice makes perfect. It's comparable to skinning and fleshing a beaver. The more you do, the better you get at it.