Fish cleaner: manual, electric, DIY

Almost everyone knows that seafood plays an important role in human life. Fish is considered not only tasty, but also a healthy product containing useful substances, such as vitamins and trace elements. Cleaning fish is the most unpleasant task that takes a lot of useful time. In addition, you will have to put in a lot of effort. As a result of this difficult operation, it takes a long time to clean the kitchen.

Fishermen generally refuse to clean fish at all, shifting all responsibility on housewives who are not enthusiastic about this action. To date, many techniques have been tried that simplify this process. If you approach it creatively, then cleaning the fish will not take much time, and the most unexpected item can serve as a fixture.

Fish Cleaning Tips

First, it should be remembered that freshly caught fish is always much easier to clean than one that has been stored for some time.

• As a rule, cleaning the caught fish directly near the reservoir is considered the best option.
• To cut fish, it is better to use only sharp and high-quality knives.
• Cleaning of fish is carried out exclusively on a special cutting board for fish.
• The cleaning process must be accurate and of high quality. The quality of the cooked fish will depend on this.
• Before starting such a process, it is advisable to identify the fish in cold water with vinegar.
• It will be much easier to clean the fish if you insert a wooden stick all the way into its mouth or fix its tail on the board itself. Holding the fish with your fingers behind the eyes, it is pulled out until a characteristic crunch appears.
• To keep the fish firmly in your fingers, you can wrap the tail of the fish with a napkin or rub your fingers with salt if there are no abrasions on them.

How to clean fish?

As a rule, all fish are cleaned with knives. There are types of fish that do not need to be cleaned. These species include salmon, gobies and other fish. It is simply fried in a pan until golden brown. Quite quickly and easily it will be possible to clean a catfish or burbot. Mucus is simply washed off with water and the carcass is rubbed with salt. Carp is also not difficult to clean, especially if it has just been caught: the scales are removed with your fingers, without much effort. Small fish such as bleak should be sprinkled with salt and rinsed with water. As for the ruff and perch, these are problematic fish in terms of cleaning. And if it is also a small perch and a ruff, then you will have to seriously sweat.

It will be difficult to clean a live fish that continues to resist. It is better to stun such fish. At the first stage of cleaning, the fish must be thoroughly rinsed with water to remove mucus. For cleaning, ordinary knives, special fish knives, fish scalers and scrapers are used.

Hand tools

Mechanical methods, although fast, are not very high quality. Large fish, especially if there are a lot of them, are easy and easier to clean with your hands. With one hand, the fish is taken by the tail, and the carcass is cleaned with the fingers of the free hand, in the direction against the direction of scale growth. In hard-to-reach places, it is better to use a knife.

If it doesn’t work with a thumbnail, then you can arm yourself with a kitchen knife. It should not be big, but wide. So that the scales do not scatter throughout the kitchen, the carcass can be identified in a plastic bag, and in it, with gentle movements, slowly, the scales are removed from the carcass. If the fish is cleaned in the sink, then it is better to close the drain with a metal mesh. The correct position of the carcass is with the head towards you. The scales are removed in the direction from the tail to the head with smooth, precise movements.

Many say that the best tool is cleaning for fish, which is more like a hairbrush. In fact, this is a flat plate with not sharp teeth, not large. Such teeth are the main working part of this tool. This tool is available to clean the fish of any size.

Some housewives successfully use a vegetable knife or mini grater for chopping vegetables, but in this case, the edges of the grater must be sharp. Well, if there is running water. If there are no such conditions of civilization, then they take a basin and pour water into it. Some species of fish are distinguished by the presence of small, tightly adjacent scales to the body. It is better to put such fish in boiling water before the cleaning process.

Electric household fish scaler

This is one of the most effective devices for quickly cleaning fish. This electric appliance is very popular among anglers, catering workers and owners of private fish shops. Home fish scalers can operate both from the mains, and from a car or built-in battery. Therefore, such a device can be taken with you on a fishing trip.

Household electric fish scalers are very popular. Among them are such models as RF 01, VesElectric 4000 with a battery and a container. The presence of a special screen in the fish scaler does not allow the scales to scatter in all directions.

Prices for fish scalers

The average price for these devices is about 4 thousand rubles.

The advantages of fish scalers include:

• Speed ​​and quality of cleaning.
• Ease of use.
• Mechanical fish scalers are much cheaper than electric ones.
• When using electric fish scalers, the cleaning process is much faster, although there is a possibility of damage to the flesh of the fish.
• The scales do not scatter in all directions, unlike conventional cleaning methods.

Do-it-yourself fish cleaning device

Mechanical devices, in the form of various graters, are sold both in stores and on the market. Despite this, such devices are easy to make at home, showing skill and dexterity. It is enough to take a wooden block and a piece of tin with holes around which sharp notches are located. If the tin is attached to the bar, then the resulting device will help to quickly clean the fish.

It is not difficult to make a grater from an ordinary tin can if you drill several holes of the desired diameter in it.

A grater can also be made from beer bottle caps. To do this, you also need to take a piece of a wooden bar and stuff several covers on it, notches up. It turns out a simple, and at the same time, an effective device for cleaning fish.

If the grater is difficult to make due to the lack of the necessary parts, then you can use a fork or spoon. In this case, the scales will scatter in all directions. To prevent this from happening, it is better to place the fish in a plastic bag.

Where are fish scalers sold?

This simple device can really be bought on the market, in a store or an Internet store. Here you can find not a small assortment of such devices. If there is a need to purchase an electric fish cleaner, then first it is advisable to familiarize yourself with the principle of its operation and reviews. This will help you choose the right product.

Fish cleaning tricks

The fish can be easily cleaned if fixed. Since the fish is cleaned from the tail and towards the head, it is enough to securely fasten the tail. As practice shows, cleaning efficiency is higher if the fish is cleaned not with a sharp, but with a blunt side. In this case, you need to be extremely careful.

Electric fish scalers do this much faster. Unfortunately, they have one, but a significant drawback – it’s high cost. Not every housewife will allow herself such a pleasure. Its use is justified when processing a large number of fish, and if a fisherman brings home a dozen carp, then it is better and faster to clean them in the classic way. As a rule, in such cases, beer caps and boiling water are used. At the same time, it should be noted that modern traffic jams are somewhat weaker than the old Soviet ones, so they quickly lose their main functions.

If you immediately clean fresh fish, then in the future you will not have to spend additional effort on this operation. If the fish is bought in the market, then you need to be able to choose, otherwise you can buy a non-fresh product.

Chinese devices have proven themselves from a good side. In any case, patience and many years of experience is indispensable. Having experience will allow you to cope with the task, even if there are no accessories other than a regular kitchen knife. And if there are also devices, then the question will disappear by itself.

And yet, do not forget that it is better to clean fresh fish. If the fish is planned to be frozen, then without fail it is first cleaned, washed well and only then sent to the freezer.

As for the cleaning method, it is better to choose it depending on the main factor that is related to the amount of fish. If there are few fish, then it is enough to use a knife, but if there are a lot of fish, then you will have to use some kind of device, since cleaning the fish should not be delayed for a long time.