Originally Posted by Aaron&Julie
We bleed them right away while they're still kicking, and bring a large cooler with eight 2-litre frozen water bottles (the large soda types). Then the fish goes right into the cooler when we hit the beach, and when we get home we gut 'em ASAP, then throw a couple more 2-litre frozen in, along with a large bad of crushed ice. We wait a day, then filet it, keeping the filets cool in another smaller cooler with a couple more frozen bottles. When we're done fileting, we vacuum pack ASAP, except what we're eating that night. If done this way, your vacuum sealed fish will last up to 2 years or more, just about as fresh as the day you caught them. We do this with all of our fish, yellowtail, halibut, tuna, etc.
We have a huge chest freezer at home, full of clams, lobsters, and the different fish species, plus a bag of crushed ice ready to use, and at least 12 frozen 2-litre bottles in it, at any given time. The crushed ice comes in handy because it comes in direct contact with the length of the fish, while the bottles keep it very chilled. Waiting a day to filet firms up the meat, making it so much easier to filet.
You'll save mucho dollars using the frozen bottle idea. One note, when filling the bottles leave about 2" of air at the top, then squeeze out the air and put the cap on. Ice expands when freezing, and you don't need the bottles bursting in your freezer.
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