There is something to be said for a shore lunch, you know, frying up a couple of fresh-caught fish in a cast iron frying pan on a small campfire right beside a lake or stream.
“Best table in the restaurant,” may father used to say. I sure used to enjoy those shore lunches. Maybe it was the surroundings or having worked up an appetite being out in the fresh air, but somehow things seemed to taste better.
Or maybe I just remember things tasting better, because if the truth be told, I’m not really all that big on eating trout. I much prefer halibut or walleye. Although I have been known to cook up an occasional trout for dinner, especially when I’m up at the cabin. Unless of course the trout happen to have that awful, totally distasteful muddy flavour trout sometimes have in certain lakes at certain times of the year.
Contrary to what some people believe, the muddy taste in trout has nothing to do with mud on the bottom of the lake. It is caused by a chemical compound called geosmin. The two primary producers of geosmin in freshwater lakes are the blue-green algae you see on the surface of some lakes and actinomyus bacteria which causes decomposition of organic material on the lake bottom.
Algae and actinomyus bacteria release geosmin into the water (it is actually released when the living algae and bacteria die) which trout breathe in through their gills and then transfer, through the bloodstream, into their skin, flesh and muscle tissue.
Geosmin accumulates in the skin, fatty tissue and muscles of a fish and are only eliminated with time once the algae bloom clears and/or decomposition slows. The rate of elimination is dependant on water temperature and the fat content of the fish, which is species and age (size) specific.
Ironically both algae and decomposition increases in warmer water, while it takes longer for a fish to eliminate the geosmin compounds from their system in cooler water due to metabolism rates.
Although fish can still taste muddy in the fall, they are more of a problem during the hot summer months when the algae is in full bloom. The problem diminishes as water temperatures cool down and are less likely to occur in lakes which are relatively deep and low in organic matter.
The problem can also exist in lakes with a high degree of clay particles suspended in water. The clay absorbs the geosmin that is subsequently passed through the gills of the fish.
It can be hard to predict which lakes will have muddy tasting fish. Two lakes of similar depth, with the same type of algae bloom, may not produce similar tasting fish. Sometimes it’s just a matter of what micro-habitat a fish frequents when eating.
If you do keep a fish that you suspect is going to taste muddy, you can usually distinguish a slight muddy smell to it when you’re cleaning the fish. You can try soaking your fish in vinegar to help remove the muddy taste, but I’ve never really found vinegar all that successful. (Geosmin breaks down in acid). Once I know the muddy taste is there I can always taste it – regardless of how it is prepared, how much spice might be used or what kind of sauce it is covered with.
There is, however, a much simpler way to get rid of the muddy taste in trout. Simply return the fish to the water and figure out something else to make for dinner.
And, if by chance you have a hankering for something sweet and chocolatey for dessert, you can always have mud pie.
