Fish Sandwiches and Family

We were sitting around the cottage and somehow the topic switched to fast-food, from there a popular fish sandwich was mentioned. Having never tried one, I decided we should make our own. My youngest nephew enjoys cooking, especially the fish we catch, I had been mentoring him about where to catch ‘em in the lake, gave him his first fillet knife a few years back and for the past couple summers he’s been the one in charge of the breading. Cottage fish fries have long been a cherished memory, now I hope to be passing along the same to another generation.

A frying pan full of pike and walleye is a good start for our fish sandwiches.

After a good day on the water there was a mix of walleye and pike fillets set aside. A quick stop in town for some brioche buns, fresh lettuce and tomatoes from mom’s garden. Speaking of the garden, the real winner was finding some fresh dill weed my little brother had planted on a whim. Let me tell you, adding dill weed to the breading made that fish pop. Over the few weeks I was there we recreated this a few times. I’m already looking forward to getting back east and making it again. As an added bonus, dill weed is now stocked up in my pantry, though it’s not the same as picking it fresh.

Food has a way of creating moments, a couple years back I brought black bear and blacktail deer sausage my wife and I had made while my brother-in-law added his homemade whitetail sausage to the mix on the barbecue. While my nephews vacuumed up the black bear I couldn’t get enough of the whitetail sausage, it had been a few years since I’d had any. The fish sandwiches produced the same reaction, voracious appetites, dinner time conversation about how delicious they were and a deeper appreciation for the cottage, the fish in the lake and wild things in general.

See you on the water and the mountain.

-Matthew Mallory