How to salt and dry pike at home

Preparation

Since the process of drying pike is not much different from drying other fish, in principle you can use any recipe to obtain such tasty fish meat.

However, the preparation of each type of fish for further processing by salting, smoking or drying sometimes differs markedly.

So, in order for it to be delicious at the very end, you initially need to:

rinse the pike well;
gut it;
remove gills;

dry with a paper towel;
make shallow cuts along the entire spine;
open the fish, that is, crucify it.

A simple recipe for drying

Dried fish is fish that has gone through a cold drying process. How to do everything correctly so as not to spoil an expensive product and not force your household to eat tasteless pike?

Generously coat the pike with salt (on both sides).
Place it in a bowl with high walls (the fish should fit completely in it).
Sprinkle more salt on top of the fish.

There is no need to be afraid that the product will be over-salted, because fish meat will absorb as much as necessary, and not an gram more.

How to properly salt the “royal” fish

How to pickle pike? Prepare:

fish;
7 tbsp. spoons of salt;
3.5 tablespoons of sugar;
laurel leaf;
ground black pepper;
ground cloves;
rosemary.

It is worth considering that the given amount of salt is recommended to be used for pike weighing no more than 1.5 kilograms.

So, to pickle pike: prepare the fish, and also cut off the fins, head and tail.

These parts, like other pieces of fish meat, will be useful in the future for preparing fish soup.

remove the spine and ribs using a careful dorsal incision;
cut the fish into pieces, this will make it easier to get salted meat;
prepare the pickling mixture by mixing all the ingredients except the bay leaf;
place the fish, well rubbed with the mixture, in a glass jar; you can also use enamel dishes;
close it with a lid, quite tightly;
set the oppression;
leave the pike “alone” for 48 hours (in a cool place).

Salting pike caviar

To salt pike caviar at home, you must first remember one rule: to separate the eggs from the chaff, you should use only an enamel colander.

Kitchen utensils made from other materials can ruin the initially round shape of the caviar.

The second important rule is this: for salting you must use only fresh fish eggs.

And before you start salting it, prepare:

the product itself;
salt;
a mixture of peppers (red, black, white);
Bay leaf;
cold water.

In addition, stock up on gauze and an enamel saucepan.

What to do? Fill a saucepan with water and place it on the fire.

Place bay leaves and spices into boiling water.
Turn off the gas and immerse the eggs in boiling water.
Stir.
Close the lid.
Let everything sit for 15-20 minutes.
Carefully drain the water through cheesecloth.

Such a valuable product should be stored in the refrigerator.

Is it possible to get dried fish without spending months preparing it or using brine? Of course you can.

And to dry pike like this, you need:

prepare the fish;
cut the large carcass into pieces, and make long side slits on the small one;
rub the pike with salt on all sides, including the inside;
place in a plastic container;

By the way, if you carefully watch the videos that clearly demonstrate how to properly dry pike, you can see one interesting detail. Namely: many famous chefs use parchment paper instead of a container.

install oppression on top;
put in the refrigerator;
wait 72 hours;
drain liquid from the container if any appears;
put the fish in the freezer for 72 hours.

This is how easy it is to prepare an excellent snack at home without any dryers or unnecessary movements.

So, in fact, drying, wilting or salting pike is not difficult. It is enough to have a little free time, patience and coarse rock salt on hand, because it is best suited for drying fish.

And it starts with cleaning and salting it. Some people cut off the head and clean the scales, but this is absolutely unnecessary. Just gut the pike, make a cut along the ridge, pour coarse salt inside, place it in a pan, and sprinkle with salt again.

Now the fish needs to be thoroughly salted. Cover the pan with a lid, put it in the refrigerator, and let it sit for 3-4 days.

Before drying, you need to wash off the salt. Rinse the pike in several waters and soak for half an hour in cold water, to which you can add a couple of tablespoons of vinegar. This will not affect the taste in any way, but will repel annoying flies.

Hang the pike by the upper lip with a wire hook, and cover it with gauze, folded in half, making a kind of bag. Inspect from all sides so that there are no holes and flies do not get to your pike.

The fish should be brought home at night so that it does not gain moisture. With good sun and wind, large pike will dry out for at least a week.

How to salt pike for drying

For the salting process, use dishes that do not oxidize. An enamel pan is suitable for this, as well as a plastic or glass container of a suitable size.

If you want to learn how to salt pike for drying so that the dried fish turns out tasty, then take note of these simple tips. It is important to prepare the fish correctly and not make a mistake with the required salt concentration.

Let's start the cooking process:

The fish is washed thoroughly and the insides are removed, in this case it turns out drier. But if you wish, you don’t have to gut the pike.
Prepare an enamel pan of sufficient volume and pour a 1 centimeter layer of salt onto its bottom.
Place the pike on its side in the pan, and again cover it with a centimeter layer of salt on top. Place all the fish in this manner. Sprinkle the last layer with salt.
Place a weight in the form of a weight or a container of water on top of the lid so that the fish releases juice.
Place the pan in a dark place for 2 weeks.

After 2 weeks, the next stage of salting pike at home begins, the recipes for which we provide in this article. After salting, the fish is soaked for 2 days in cold water.

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This process occurs as follows:

The already salted pike is removed from under the load and washed thoroughly.
After this, it must be lowered into a container with cool water.
After two days, the fish is taken out and hung to drain off excess liquid. This completes its preparation for drying.

Dried pike in an electric dryer

Large specimens are very fatty, and it is very difficult to dry them entirely, and there is no need to, if you can prepare a delicious snack for beer.

Clean the pike from scales, cut off the head and gut it. Take it apart into fillets and cut the fillets into thin strips.

1.5 liters of water;
5 tbsp. l. salt;

Heat until the salt dissolves. Add spices to taste to the warm marinade and soak the prepared pike strips for 5 hours.

Drain the marinade, cover the tray of the electric dryer with parchment paper, and place the fish pieces in it.

The Ezidri electric dryer sets the temperature at 60 degrees, and the drying time for pike is about 10 hours.

Taste it, keep in mind that you won’t eat it all at once, and it will dry out even more on its own.

For more information about drying pike in an electric dryer, watch the video:

Drying fish: crucian carp and pike

Five minutes of theory
Selection and storage
Benefits and harms
Classic recipe for dried pike

Dried pike stands apart from this delicious series. This predatory fish, typical of our reservoirs, is famous among gourmets for its lean white meat and bright, specific taste. The pike is placed in the fish soup, fried with garlic shoots and, of course, dried. There are quite a few options for how to dry pike, but all of them, one way or another, fit into the general concept of preparing any fish in this way. There is nothing difficult about doing this at home with your own hands.

Five minutes of theory

From a technology point of view, drying any food product means cold drying it. Under natural conditions, in the sun, in fresh air, fish, like other products, is dehydrated under the influence of the ultraviolet spectrum of solar radiation.

At the same time, the main part of the product’s fat does not disappear forever, but is redistributed throughout the muscle tissue, so the fish does not lose its visible attractiveness, unlike dried fish. Redistributed fats increase shelf life: properly dried fish may well remain tasty and edible after six months.

In fact, drying was one of the very first options for preparing and preserving food in history. Modern technologies make it possible to carry out drying using artificial dryers, which greatly reduces the time to obtain the finished product with only minor losses in quality. But at the same time, you need to understand that fish made only using a dryer, without treatment in the sun, will simply be dried, and not dried.

Selection and storage

There are no particular difficulties in correctly selecting raw materials for drying. You can use both fresh and frozen fish. It will be better if the scales are clean and undamaged, and the color is natural.

During the ripening process, under the influence of solar radiation and ultraviolet radiation, the microflora on the fish surface will be suppressed, and the fat will oxidize to the state of an elastic film. Moreover, after oxidation, the fish meat will become amber in color, oily and translucent. The accumulated aldehydes and peroxides will give it a peculiar aroma familiar to everyone.

Being a seasonal product, dried fish has shelf life limits. Before long-term preservation, it must be checked for mold, damage and oxidation. Whole scales guarantee long-term storage.

You can store it:

wrapped in dense fabric in several layers, hung in a room without natural light;
using tin cans with a closed lid;
using a freezer;
using bags or baskets for large quantities.

The only way you should definitely not store it is with plastic bags.

Benefits and harms

Any dried fish, including pike, contains a lot of Omega-3 fatty acids, which destroy cancer cells. Its regular use reduces the risks of cancer and heart attacks. It is recommended for women to overcome childbirth and postpartum depression.

Heavily salted dried fish has a negative effect on hypertensive patients. When purchasing or preparing at home, this factor must be taken into account. Those with fish allergies are completely prohibited from consuming dried products.

Classic pike yukola recipe

Pike yukola is a dried fish. This is a very tasty and unusual dish. Its recipe has been known for a long time. Dried pike is an ideal addition as a beer snack. The pike itself is very useful. Therefore, the dish cannot be considered harmful if consumed in moderation.

Pike yukola can be prepared in several ways. However, the most correct and classic way is to keep the spicy and salted fish carcass outside near the fire. It should be smoked a little - this is the taste of real pike yukola. The recipe for this dish came from cold Siberia. In Yakutia, they still know first-hand all the secrets of preparing dried fish. Such food saved the Yakut people from freezing cold long winters. Since fish yukola is very nutritious and contains a storehouse of vitamins. Pike is rich in protein and could save you from winter exhaustion. Dried fish easily and in its simplicity replaced canned fish. It did not need to be sealed in jars and was stored for a long time without problems. For the Siberian nomads, this was simply a godsend. It was possible to prepare dishes and nutritious fish soup from it. Which is still being done today.

Classic pike yukola was prepared without any additives and was not even salted. Left outside in the wind. Due to the fact that it froze at night and thawed again during the day under the sun, all the water left it. This was a big plus, since this process contributes to a longer shelf life of pike yukola. In some areas they added salt before felting, but rarely because the salted fish then led to severe thirst. In some regions, smoking pike over a fire was common.

Pike yukola, in addition to its rich beneficial composition, has another great advantage - it is low-calorie.

The classic yukola recipe requires only freshly caught fish for preparation. No spices, seasonings or salt are needed. The cooking recipe will be convenient for owners of private houses.

Recipe:

Remove the head of the fish. Gut and scale the fish.
Each pike carcass must be cut longitudinally from top to bottom, from the back. So that only the large bone holds the two parts together.
Then you need to remove all the large bones, and transverse cuts are made along the entire length of the fish itself.
The finished pike halves are hung in an open area, in the yard or veranda. The main thing is that the place is windy and does not receive direct sunlight. It is better to choose a shaded room. Under the sun, the fish will turn out too dry and unpleasant.
The readiness of the fish depends on its size. The larger the fish, the longer the felting process will take.
Due to the fact that the fish is in an open area, there is a high probability that flies and other insects will not attack. To avoid these unpleasant consequences, it is recommended to wrap the fish in gauze.
To give the fish an unusual taste, you can smoke it near a fire.

This fish is suitable for cooking, such as soups. You can take it with you on a long hike without fear that it may deteriorate.

Classic recipe for dried pike

Before drying pike, it must first be gutted and washed thoroughly. Of course, do not touch the scales, but be sure to remove the gills.
If the pike is large, you can make a longitudinal cut on its back so that the drying process occurs evenly.
It is important to salt the carcass generously, both outside and inside. It is customary to dry several pieces at a time with the expectation that they can be eaten in a short time.
After this, they are placed in a bucket, pan or cauldron, generously sprinkled with salt, and covered with a wooden board (for example, a cutting board). Oppression is installed on top, and the entire “structure” is sent to a dark, cool room. Moreover, the more fish fit in the container, the heavier the pressure required.
The salting stage can last from 3-4 days to a week or more, it depends on the volume of fish being prepared.
When the salting is finished, it is important to rinse the pike well with cold water or soak it for several hours.
Next, the carcasses need to be strung on hooks individually or all together on one rope through holes that need to be made in the tail of each fish. It is better to dry pike upside down.
It is important to find a ventilated place to hang fish. The fish will be ready in a few days. This will become clear from the pointed, elastic back, delicate taste and smell typical of dried fish.

At the same time, the very process of cleaning fish from scales is considered a special “relish” - unhurried, accompanied by table stories and fishing exploits. However, it is quite possible to “get confused” and clean the pike of scales and bones before serving by cutting its fillet into strips. It won't turn out any worse.

Sources:

https://7ya-i-ya.ru/recepty/vyalenie-ryby.html https://suseky.com/zasolka-i-sushka-shhuki-dva-sposoba-sushim-shhuku-na-taranku-iv-elektrosushilke / https://edaturistu.ru/ryba/kak-vyalit-shchuku

Dried pike yukola with salt and spices

This recipe for yukola and pike is more common, as it is richer in flavor and can be eaten as a separate dish or snack.

Ingredients:

pike – about 1.5 kg, but ideally you can take as much as you have;
salt – 3 tbsp. l.;
ground black or red pepper - to taste, half as much as salt;
bay leaf - a couple of leaves;
sugar – 1 tbsp. l.;
dried seasonings as desired.

It is better to take seasonings with dried herbs and not too hot or sweet.

First cooking method:

Wash and clean the pike carcasses thoroughly. If the fish is fresh and not frozen from the store, gut the insides and clean the scales.
Divide the pike in half with a cross-section and remove the large spinal bone.
Cut off the remaining fins and remove the remaining bones. You need to try to get rid of all possible bones; if it is difficult to do with your hands, you can use tweezers for this.
Each half of the fish should be cut at an angle to the skin at a distance of 2-3 centimeters.
Set aside the fish and prepare a special marinade for it.
Take a small saucepan and put salt, pepper, sugar, bay leaf, all seasonings and spices in it.
Fill it all with water and cook on the stove. As soon as the marinade boils, remove from heat.
When the solution has cooled, place the fish in it. It will take 3 hours for the pike to soak, but it is better to leave it in the marinade for the whole night.
Remove the fish and hang it in a well-ventilated place to dry.
Keep it like this for about 3-4 days.
After these days, put the pike on a wire rack and put it in the oven. You need to place a baking sheet or something else underneath the grill, as juice will leak out of the fish.
At a temperature of about 50 degrees, leave the fish in the oven for 4 hours.
Then remove the fish from the oven and let cool. The most delicious and incredibly tasty pike yukola is ready!

This pike yukola will not have an unpleasant aftertaste and will be stored for a long time. You can safely invite your friends and relatives and treat them to aromatic and spicy fish.

Spicy yukola can be prepared in an even simpler second way:

Simply rub all the seasonings and spices into the finished cleaned pike carcass. To do this, you don't need to spend a lot of time on the marinade. And the taste of the fish will not differ much from the taste of fish prepared in the first way.
Then put the carcasses in a large container, cover with salt and mix, rubbing the salt into the fish.
Now the pike carcasses need to be pressed tightly against each other on the meat side, not the skin side. Leave the fish in this state to salt for a whole day, or just overnight.
The next day, pike soaked in salt and spices. Must be hung in a well-ventilated area.

This option is also suitable for city residents, because the fish can be hung on the balcony. Don’t forget to ventilate it or even open the windows. The more ventilation the room has, the faster the fish will dry out.

Step-by-step preparation

The process itself looks like this:

Before salting fresh pike for drying, you need to thoroughly wash off the mucus from its skin and keep it cool for a couple of hours.
Carcasses longer than 35 cm must be gutted, gills and caviar removed. At the same time, leave the head.
Rinse the fish and season generously with salt. Pike is found in the river, so it often becomes a source of dangerous parasites. To be sure, you need to use more salt (200g/kg). This will prevent harm that the fish can cause. On carcasses weighing 1.5 kg or more, longitudinal cuts are made on the back with a sharp knife and filled with crystals.
Now the fish is transferred to a container with the prepared salty mixture (only with the belly up). To one part salt there are 4 parts clean water.

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Next, the containers are moved to a dark, cool place (at a temperature within + 15 - 20 degrees).
Before drying fresh pike at home, you need to remember that large specimens will be salted for about five days, while smaller ones will need three. After this time, the fish is removed from the brine. Now it needs to be washed with water with the addition of acetic acid. After this, soak in clean fresh water. As soon as the pike floats to the surface, it needs to be removed and dried.
The last step is stringing. You can hang it to dry by the tail (so the flesh is better saturated with fat) or by the head, threading the thread through the eye holes. Make sure that the carcasses do not touch closely to each other.
Before drying salted pike at home, you need to choose a place in the open air under awnings or in well-ventilated areas. Periodically you need to check the readiness of the product. It will take more than a week to dry “to ram” in warm, windy weather.

Advice! If you add a little lemon juice to the brine, it will minimize the muddy aroma that pike smells of.

“Cooking Together” magazine of gourmet travelers

I know how to cook this fish deliciously, how to boil fish soup, how to pickle pike. There are simply tons of recipes in my cookbook.

Pike is the brightest representative of the family of predators. Its meat is highly valued due to its beneficial properties. Since ancient times, this fish was considered an exquisite delicacy not only for ordinary fishermen, but also for persons of high government rank. Pike meat was especially valued in France, since its low calorie content and excellent taste distinguished it from a number of other similar food products. You can prepare a huge number of amazingly tasty dishes from pike: fry, stew or steam - it’s up to the chef, but all culinary creations from this predator turn out equally tasty and impressive.

I am a hereditary fisherman and cooking from pike meat is my passion. I know how to cook this fish deliciously, how to boil fish soup, how to pickle pike. There are simply tons of recipes in my cookbook. However, there are favorite culinary masterpieces that have been collected for centuries, passed from generation to generation, from mother to daughter, and have become a traditional family attraction of our family.

How to properly salt pike - several recipes

Dry method of salting pike

Wet method of salting pike

1. I will tell you further how to salt pike at home using the wet method. And we will salt it using two recipes. Which one is tastier and healthier is up to you to decide. So, the recipe for salted pike using the wet method is quite simple and easy. To do this, we first prepare a special saline solution - brine. This solution should be as salty as possible, I take 6 tbsp. spoons of salt per 1 liter of water.

I stir everything well, heat it up a little and pour the fish into containers. Useful advice! – use a glass or enamel container for this purpose; iron utensils will not withstand this torture. We leave our pike to marinate and salt in brine for 2-3 days. If, after the required time has passed, you take out the fish and it seems too salty, soak it in ordinary water for an hour or two and everything will be fine. After soaking, you can pour lemon juice and olive or sunflower oil on it. The taste will be divine!

So, let's prepare the brine for our pike. Take water, pour it into a saucepan and put it on the fire. Add salt and sugar and mix everything. Add spices there: ground black pepper, allspice, coriander, cloves and bay leaf. Finely chop the garlic and place it in the pan. As soon as everything boils, add vinegar.

We do this very carefully so as not to get burned by the evaporation. Fill our fish with this marinade in a plastic or glass container and leave for 3-4 hours. In principle, during this time the pike will be sufficiently salted and imbued with an exquisite taste and aroma, but ideally, normal salting will require at least 1 day. Then you take the fish out of the container, pour it with sunflower oil, sprinkle it with onion, cut into rings and serve it with vodka and fresh potatoes.

3. You can also pickle the pike with salt, ground black pepper and sugar. The taste of such fish will be specific, so it will appeal only to gourmets. However, it's also worth a try.

For this purpose, take a deep plate and mix in it 2 tablespoons of salt, 1 tablespoon of sugar and 0.5 teaspoon of ground black pepper. Mix everything thoroughly and rub the fish with this mixture. Also pour the mixture into the belly of the fish. Place the pike in a plastic container and cover with something heavy. Leave the fish to salt for 3-4 days. After this time has elapsed, drain the liquid and place the container with the pike in the refrigerator.

The community has come up with recipes for salting and marinating fish:

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How to dry pike yourself

Pike is a very tasty fish, especially when dried. But it is important to know how to dry pike correctly. The wrong approach in this matter can simply ruin the catch. Poorly prepared fish may have an unpleasant aftertaste or even begin to rot inside.

Preparing the fish

In order to dry pike at home, you need to properly prepare it. First of all, you need to take the fish and gut it, but you do not need to remove the scales, this is not necessary.

Salting

Then the gutted pike needs to be salted. The dry method is best suited for this, since it allows you to remove a certain amount of liquid from the pike already at this stage. You need to take enamel or plastic containers. Cover the bottom with a layer of coarse salt, place the fish and cover it again with a layer of salt. Salt should be placed evenly so that there is no accumulation of large amounts in one place. After this, you need to cover the product with a plate of suitable diameter and press it down with a heavy object to create a press.

After some time, liquid will begin to come out of the fish. There are several opinions about it. Some people advise constantly draining the liquid to ensure greater dehydration of the fish, while some, on the contrary, recommend leaving the product in the brine so that it is better salted.

Advice! It is important to remember that pike is a river fish; it may contain unwanted parasites that should not enter the human body. Therefore, it is important to salt the pike as best as possible. Professionals recommend salting pike using 200 grams of salt for every kilogram of fish.

The fish should be salted for 3-7 days, depending on the size of the individual. Professionals advise drying medium-sized specimens - this is the only criterion for selection. The weight of the fish before drying should be around a kilogram. Pike of this size will be well salted and dry optimally and will delight dry fish lovers throughout the winter.

Soaking

After the salted pike is removed from the brine, it should be washed in water with several tablespoons of acetic acid, and then soaked in water so that it releases excess salt. After the pike floats to the surface, it can be removed from the water and dried. In general, it is recommended to soak the product for as many hours as the days it was salted. Only after this can you start drying.

Drying the fish

How to properly dry caught pike?
First of all, it is important to protect the product from insects; the main problem is flies. There is an opinion that for this it is better to hang the pike in the evening, when the flies are no longer active. By morning, the liquid on the surface of the fish and in the abdominal cavity will evaporate, and the flies will become uninterested in it. Other experts advise coating the carcass with vegetable oil or a vinegar solution; these measures will also get rid of unnecessary attention from insects. Subsequently, you will get dried pike without the larvae of annoying flies. The product should be dried by hanging it in a dry place with good ventilation at a temperature of 18 to 25 degrees. They hang the fish by the head, but you can also hang it by the tail, there is no big difference. The belly of the pike should be expanded by inserting toothpicks or twigs across it that can hold the edges. Dried pike will be obtained after 2-3 weeks, depending on the size. You need to dry the fish in the shade, avoiding direct sunlight. In the fall, the fish may not be completely dried outside and requires the process to be completed indoors near the radiator.

You can dry the fish by placing it in the oven. This method allows you to speed up the process and get results in less than a day. To dry the product in the oven, you need to put it in straw, this is done so that the fish does not burn on the baking sheet, otherwise it will spoil the taste of the pike. The straw needs to be periodically replaced with fresh straw. The main thing is to make sure that the pike’s head does not burn; to do this, you can wrap it in foil.

Dried fish can be stored for a very long time and will delight fish lovers in winter. The product does not require special conditions for storage and will lie perfectly in a cool, dark place.

Preparation

The most suitable fish for drying will weigh no more than 1 kg; such pike will be salted well and quickly, and will also dry evenly. In larger specimens, it is advisable to remove the gills during processing; it is advisable to remove the entrails from fish of all sizes. But the scales are not touched during processing.

To prepare the royal appetizer, you need to prepare all the ingredients. Rinse the pike thoroughly in running water with a brush, then gut it and rinse again.

Dry the fish a little with paper towels, transfer it to a deep plastic, glass or enamel container for salting and cover thoroughly with salt, as shown in the photo. This salt also needs to be carefully hammered into the gills, mouth, belly and rubbed with salt under the fins. In this state, leave the pike for 2 days in a cold place.

After two days, you need to take out the fish, wash off all the salt from it and soak in cool water for 120 minutes. During this time, it is necessary to periodically change the water to fresh and cool water.

After soaking the pikes, they must be thoroughly wiped with napkins so that there is absolutely no moisture left anywhere. Wrap well-dried carcasses tightly with a piece of gauze and rewind tightly with thread (see photo), then hang them in a well-ventilated area without direct sunlight. You can hang the fish either by the tail or by the head; in both options, drying will occur correctly.

After 1-1.5 weeks (depending on weather conditions, if the fish was dried outdoors), delicious dried pike, prepared at home according to our simple recipe, will be ready. As you can see, making dried fish with your own hands is not at all difficult. Low-alcohol carbonated drinks and kvass are perfect for this delicacy. Bon appetit!

There are a huge number of pike recipes. This is body, and jellied, and baked in the oven, and fried in batter or regular breading, this is abalone and stuffed pike.

One of the delicacies is smoked or dried pike. Let's look at how to properly salt pike for drying or smoking at home in more detail.

How to dry pike at home

Recipe for dried pike:

We wash the caught pike to remove mucus and let it stand in a cool place for 1-3 hours.
A carcass up to 35 cm long is dried without cutting. Large specimens are gutted from the gill covers to the anal fin.
Before salting, the carcass must be thoroughly washed. Rub tightly with salt. The gills are clogged with salt (in large fish it is better to remove the gills). For pike weighing more than 1.5 kg, a cut is made along the back, where salt is also poured.
Then they place it belly up in a pickling container. At the bottom of the barrel or tub where it is folded, a brine solution is first poured at the rate of 1 part salt to 4 parts water.
We send these containers to a cool area away from the sun so that the pike does not disappear. A cellar, pit, etc. is perfect. The main thing is that the temperature does not exceed 15-20 degrees.
After 3-5 days, depending on the size of the pike and weather conditions (at high temperatures, the salting period is shorter), we take it out and string it on twine (rope, wire) through the eyes with the backs in one direction. Having acquired a suitable quantity, we hang it in the open air (preferably in the shade, with evening and morning sunlight). The pike must be completely ventilated so that there is no contact with nearby fish.
You can also dry it in the shade in the wind, preferably in the evening, then the top layer will dry out overnight and there will be fewer problems with flies.

Now the dried pike is ready to eat, enjoy your meal, dear friends!

The biggest difference in drying technology is how to hang it: by the tail or by the head. There are experts who believe that it is better to head down. In this position, moisture flows out through the mouth and the fish dries faster and more evenly.

We salt correctly

There are several ways to salt pike:

Dry.
Wet.
Brine (in brine).

1 . Dry is usually used when salting large specimens. For any of the methods, the fish is first prepared - gutted, washed, take a rag and wipe the carcass well.

We cut the carcass along the ridge and remove it. Preparation for pickling is complete.

We use only coarse salt. The principle is that the fish gives up all the liquid. And this is facilitated by coarse grinding.

Sprinkle the carcass evenly, including the belly. If you use small fish for these purposes, the fish can be spoiled - it will be either over-salted or under-salted.

Dry salting time is about a week in a cool place. If it is too salty, then soak it in water and hang it to dry in a draft.

2. The wet method is salting in containers. A layer of coarse salt is poured onto the bottom, the carcasses are placed on top (jack), then another layer of salt, and so on until the container is filled. A wooden circle is placed on top and oppression is placed. The container is sent to a cool place for three (four) days. Then the fish is taken out, washed and hung in a draft.

3. Brine is a strong, hot saline solution. It is prepared like this: pour water into a container, put it on fire and add more salt. Peel one potato and throw it into the solution. If it floats, then you don’t need to add salt; if it drowns, you add salt.

Pike wiped with rags are dipped into this solution. If the specimens are small, then they are immediately strung on a rope and lowered all together into a brine. The salting process takes from 1 to 2 days. Then everything is taken out, washed under running water for about half an hour and hung to dry.