Fish Dip

 For thousands of years people have been smoking meat in order to preserve it.  Communities along coastal areas in particular, had fish as a staple for smoking.  This method not only preserved the meat, but also made it quite tasty.  Our friend Shea was so helpful to crank up his Green Egg and smoke some of our fish for us.  

Shea's Green Egg just getting cranked up

Bluefish ready to be smoked for a few hours

The fish turned out quite nicely.  I put some in the freezer for the future, and made some into dip.  In addition to our smoked fish, we decided to actually go out for dinner one night.  We picked the Ocracoke Oyster Company and of course had to have oysters.  The oysters Rockefeller were phenominal.  This needs to be a repeat outing.

Oysters Rockefeller at Ocracoke Oyster Compnay

Oyster shooter

I love me some oysters.  Local resident Fletcher O'Neal runs Devil Shoal Oysters.  These are cultivated oysters, grown in the Pamlico Sound just off Ocracoke Island.  These oysters are slightly different genetically from wild oysters.  Many of you from the south are probably familiar with the old saying that you should only eat oysters in months with an "r" (eg. September through April).  Cultivated oysters can be harvested and eaten all year long.  They also filter water at up to 1 gallon an hour for each oyster.  That helps keep the water clean and reduces algae blooms.  

Fletcher O'Neal at his oyster beds

To top off a veritable seafood feast this past week, flounder season opened as well.  Keith hooked into 4 legal flounder on one day. 

Flounder (aka the swimming doormat)

One of our flounder at the fish cleaning table ready to be cleaned.

Here are some fun flounder facts:

There are 3 species of flounder common in North Carolina.  These are the summer flounder, southern flounder, and Gulf flounder.  90% of those caught in North Carolina are the southern flounder.  The flounder has an oval, flattened body with a large mouth.  They are usually brown in color with variable red, orange, green or blue marking on the body.  They can change their body color in just 2- 8 seconds to blend in with the environment.  This ability helps the flounder with both hunting for food and avoiding predators.  The flounder can bury itself in the sand/mud seafloor with just its bulging eyes sticking out.  It will lay motionless in this fashion until prey such as shrimp, crabs or other fish pass over the flounder.  Then in the blink of an eye, the flounder snatches up its meal.  Those bulging flounder eyes are located on one side of the head and can actually move independently of each other.  Based on the side of the head that the eyes are located, they can be classified in families as right-eye or left-eye flounder (no really, this is a thing).  

Keith's flounder as seen above are left-eye flounder.  I think this is really cool.  As immature larval flounder, they swim upright like other fish.  As they mature one of the eyes will migrate to the top of the fish, and the flounder will begin to swim with the eyes to the top and the other side of the flounder down.  Depending on which side of the flounder has the eyes determines if it is considered right-eye or left-eye.  (You just cannot make this stuff up).