PAN-FRIED TROUT WITH BACON

This is one of my all time favorite ways to cook trout.

6 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups thinly sliced green onions
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons rinsed drained capers
1 1/2 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon, or 1 1/2 tsp. dried
8 slices bacon
4 (8 to 10-oz.) trout fillets
salt & pepper to taste
flour

Heat 4 tablespoons of the butter in a skillet over medium heat. Saute 1 1/4 cups of the green onions in the buter for 3 minutes. Stir in the lemon juice, capers and tarragon. Remove from the heat. Cover to keep warm.

Fry the bacon in a large skillet until crisp. Remove to a paper towel to drain, reserving the bacon dripings. Crumble the bacon and add to the green onion mixture.

Sprinkle the fillets with the salt and pepper. Coat with the flour. Drain all but 3 tablespoons of the reserved pan drippings. Heat over medium heat until the butter melts. Arrange 2 of the fillets skin side up in the skillet. Cook for 2 minutes, turn. Cook for 2 more minutes or until just opaque in the center. Remove to ovenproof serving plates. Keep warm in the oven. Repeat the process with remaining trout, adding 1 tablespoon unsalted butter to the skillet if needed. Reheat the green onion mixture if needed and spoon over the top of each serving. Sprinkle each with 1 tablespoon of the remaining green onions.
Serves: 4

"Give a man a fish and he has food for a day; teach him to fish and you can get rid of him for the entire weekend."~Zenna Schaffer (I don't have a clue who this Zenna person is but let me just say I believe she is as sharp as a tack!)

TROUT OMELET

"A river is water in its loveliest form; rivers have life and sound and movement and infinity of variation, rivers are veins of the earth through which the life blood returns to the heart."~Roderick Haig-Brown

1 large cooked trout
1/2 of a large onion, diced
1/4 lb. bacon, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
1 large tomato, diced
6 eggs
1/4 cup half-and-half
1 teaspoon hot sauce
salt and pepper to taste
2 cups grated hot-pepper cheese

Flake fish from bones and set aside. Saute onion and bacon in skillet until onion is soft; add garlic and tomato and saute briefly. Set aside.

Mix together eggs, half and half, hot sauce, and salt and pepper. Add to large, lightly oiled skillet. Cook over low heat until eggs are slightly set. Add onion mixture and fish flakes to one side of egg. Cover and cook about 5 minutes over very low heat. Fold egg mixture in half to cover fish and onion. Cover with cheese, cover skillet, and cook until cheese melts.
Serves: 6

"Where the pools are bright and deep

Where the gray trout lies asleep,
Up the river and o'er the lea
That's the way for Billy and me."~James Hogg

PAN-FRIED TROUT with BACON

I flung my first fishing line when I was a wee child, on the banks of the Toe river, behind my grandparents house where I was raised in Newland, NC. Back then the water was not polluted as it is now. We swam in it and fished it with a sturdy stick that had string tied to it and a large safety pin on the end of it. We dug for the wiggling worms and did a lot of giggling and wiggling ourselves. We caught mostly trout and our 'Mama Joe' was always more than happy to sling a frying pan on the old wood stove and 'fry it up' for us hungry grandchildren. Those were the 'good ol' days and exemplified in the end who we really were and who we have became.

1/3 cup unsalted butter
1 1/2 cup thinly sliced green spring onions
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons rinsed drained capers
1 1/2 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon, or 1 1/2 teaspoons dried tarragon
8 slices of a good bacon (Oscar Mayer)
4 (8 to 10-oz.) trout fillets, boned
salt & pepper to taste
flour

Heat 4 tablespoons of the butter in a skillet over medium heat. Saute 1 1/4 cups of the green onions in the butter for 3 minutes. Stir in the lemon juice, capers and tarragon. Remove from the heat, cover to keep warm.

Fry the bacon in a large skillet until crisp. Remove to paper towels to drain, reserving the pan drippings. Crumble the bacon and add to the green onion mixture.

Sprinkle the fillets with salt and pepper and coat the fish with flour, shaking off the excess. Drain all but 3 tablespoons of the reserved pan drippings. Add 1 tablespoon of the butter to the pan drippings. Heat over medium heat until the butter melts. Arrange 2 of the fillets skin side up in the skillet. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes; turn. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes longer or just until opaque in the center. Remove the fillets to oven-proof serving plates. Keep warm in the oven. Repeat with the remaining trout, adding 1 tablespoon butter to the skillet if needed. Reheat the green onion mixture if needed and spoon over the top of each serving. Sprinkle each with 1 tablespoon of the remaining green onions.

Serves 4

"All the romance of trout fishing exists in the mind of the angler and is in no way shared by the fish."~Harold F. Blaisdell, The Philosophical Fisherman, 1969