How to Eat a Whole Fish

Once you master this easily learned craft, you'll love eating whole fish at the table.

Things You'll Need

• Sharp table knife or fish knife

Instructions

1. If you're right-handed, place the fish with its head to your right. Then take the knife, make a cut just under the gills and slide the knife along leftward, underneath the flesh that sits on top of the fish's central bone, cutting it from that bone. You'll end up with a neat, skin-on fillet that you can lift right off the bone and eat.

2. Simply lift the bone with your hands. It should come immediately away from that underlying second fillet. Now you've freed 90 percent of the meat.

3. The only difficulty may arise with the other bones in the fish. The parts of the skeleton near the top fin of the fish (the dorsal fin) and the bottom fin (the anal fin) contain smaller, more intricate bones. Getting the flesh around them may take a little work. This is especially complicated with flatfish, like Dover sole. Round fish, like bass or salmon, have far fewer bones on the bottom side supporting the anal fin.