Tag Archives: bbq

Northwest Outdoor Report

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“B” Run Steelhead Trickling into the Cowlitz
Phil Stephens from Mystical Legends Guide Service says there’s some really big three-salt hatchery steelhead cruising up the Cowlitz River right now. The “B” run on the Cowlitz just got started and while most of the guides are only picking up a few fish a day it won’t be long before the run gets into full swing. Stephens says these late steelhead hit a yarnie really well and he fishes them almost exclusively when he’s sidedrifting. He suggests using a 4 to 5 foot leader and using a little shrimp scent on the yarn sometimes helps to draw strikes. The Cowlitz “B” run starts to hit the river in earnest in early March and runs strong thru the end of April.

Lake Washington Still Productive for Cutties
Todd Daniels from Tall Tails Guide Service says he’s still catching around a half a dozen nice cutthroat a day on Lake Washington. Daniels says the fish have moved a little deeper and he’s been getting most of his bites trolling 20 to 35 feet deep. His best lures have been orange label cut plug herring and fire tiger needlefish spoons trolled at least 100 feet behind the boat. Daniels said the area between the Cedar River, Mercer Island, and the Boeing plant is where most of the action is occurring.

Skwala Hatch Nearing on the Yakima
Josh Holt from Red’s Fly Shop on the Yakima River says there’s been a few Skwala’s around, but overall the fish are still in their winter feeding mode. He says most of the trout are being caught nymphing with size 16 to 20 red or black brassy’s. The guides working out of Red’s have been getting a couple of trout a day on dries and he suspects that the Skwala hatch should get into full swing in the next couple of weeks when the weather starts to warm up. The forecast is for 60 degrees in the Yakima Canyon tomorrow and if that weather pattern continues the hatches should start to come off soon.

Puget Sound Salmon Forecasts Released
The salmon forecasts for the Puget Sound and the Washington coast were just released and numbers for Puget Sound look very good for the summer of 2013. Salmon runs of note are the Nooksack with a forecast of 46,500 Chinook. The Nooksack run has increased steadily from 23,000 king salmon in 2009 to this year’s forecast of over 46,000 fish. Hood Canal will also see an increase of Chinook with a combination of wild and hatchery Chinook making up the 69,000 Chinook projected to head back to the Canal. On the coho front the Skagit is forecast for 137,200 wild coho this fall, up from just 48,300 last year and the ever-solid Snohomish system is forecast to get just over 163,000 silvers. And the pink salmon forecast for the Puget Sound is for an astonishing 6 million pink salmon to stream into Puget Sound. While it’s too early to tell what the seasons will look like many think that with the rock-solid forecasts for both Chinook and coho they should be much the same as last year on Puget Sound. A more detailed look at the salmon run forecasts is posted in the Outdoor Line forums.

Spring Chinook Seminar at Outdoor Emporium Today
Don’t miss the yearly spring Chinook seminar today from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at Outdoor Emporium in downtown Seattle. The seminar features longtime Columbia River guides Eric Linde and Steve Leonard along with Outdoor Line host Tom Nelson. They’ll be covering everything from run timing, where to fish, and how to rig up for spring Chinook. Outdoor Emporium provides a free lunch and there will be a ton of tackle giveaways, as well.

Duck Dynasty Crew Runs off Singer Morissey
Grammy award winning singer Morrissey cancelled a performance on the Jimmy Kimmel show this past week after finding out that the cast of A&E’s hit show “Duck Dynasty” was also booked as a guest on the show. The former front man for the Smiths is an ardent animal rights activist and said he couldn’t take the risk of being on a show alongside people who amount to animal serial killers. The publicity didn’t hurt Duck Dynasty one bit either, as it posted the largest viewing audience in A&E’s history the night after the Morissey/Kimmel catfight with 9 million viewers.

Squirrel Cookoff World Championships Announced
Joe Wilson of Squirrel’s Unlimited just announced the 2013 World Champion Squirrel Cook Off to be held on September 7th. The event will be held in Bentonville, Arkansas and will feature hundreds of contestants from across the country that are the best of the best at whoopin’ up a mean batch of squirrel. Squirrel’s Unlimited president Joe Wilson says the event will draw an estimated 10,000 people to the area. Last years squirrel cook off will be televised on Bizarre Foods on the Cooking channel on April 1st. Interested parties should log onto squirrelcookoff.com for more information.

Rob Endsley
The Outdoor Line
710 ESPN Seattle
www.theoutdoorline.com

Stuff Your Stocking with Salmon Sauce

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By my count there’s only five days until Christmas and some of you may be looking for an easy gift for the angler in your life that just loves to eat salmon.

That’s me…I love to eat salmon and everything else for that matter.

A friend introduced me to Johnny’s Salmon Finishing Sauce a couple years ago and I’m hooked on this stuff. It’s almost like tartar sauce only much, much better.

They sell it at Outdoor Emporium, Sportco, and many of the larger grocery chains in Washington and you can also find it on the Johnny’s website.

Whenever I find Johnny’s Finishing Sauce on the shelf at Sportco I clean them out. It’s that good!

If your lookin’ for a last minute gift idea or perhaps a new sauce for your summer salmon barbecues I highly recommend you give this stuff a try. It’s good, good stuff!

Rob Endsley
The Outdoor Line
710 ESPN Seattle
www.theoutdoorline.com

 

Hidden Gem, Ranch House BBQ

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When you see a bunch of Harley’s parked outside a restaurant on the weekend you can bet there’s some good eats to be had inside. There’s one thing that bikers and outdoorsman have in common…they love to eat good food!

I’ve been driving by Ranch House BBQ on Hwy 101 west of Olympia, Washington for years en route to fishing, hunting, and clamming destinations on the Olympic Peninsula.

Nearly every time I cruise past the Ranch House the parking lot is stuffed with cars and bikes. Since I am usually towing a boat I opt out of stopping, but I made note that this place was probably worth hitting when the time was right.

On our way to dig razor clams back on the Washington coast back in November I was astonished to see only a half full parking lot so I whipped in there with the wife. The time was right to see what this place was all about.

The first thing you’ll notice when you walk into the Ranch House is that these folks take their bbq seriously. Ranch House BBQ has won bbq awards all over America…and all over the world. From the trophy case up front to the walls around the restaurant there are trophies, banners, and ribbons literally everywhere.

Everything on the menu looked awfully tasty but I stuck with the old bbq standby…a full rack of ribs with a cold Fish Tale ale. My wife ordered a full bbq’d chicken and of course half of that ended up on my plate. Both the chicken and the ribs were awesome.

Some of the bbq joints that I’ve visited here in Northwest toss some bbq sauce on their meats and called it “barbecue” without actually getting that smokey flavor into the meat. At the Ranch House all the meats are slow smoked with tasty rubs and little to no sauce added while they are cooking. They’ve got their own great barbecue sauce on the table to douse your food with, but the meats are so tender and delicious the sauce really isn’t necessary.

Ranch House was crowned World Champion at the BBQ World Championship in Ireland in 2000 and has won titles in Washington, California, Oregon, Idaho, Nevada, Arizona, and even Canada. In addition to all the awards owner Amy Anderson and her all-girl grill team have been featured on the Food Network numerous times. This place is the real deal!

Even if the parking lots full you owe it to yur-bad-self to stop by Ranch House BBQ in Olympia and enjoy some of Amy Anderson’s award-winning bbq. Rest assured we will be stopping in to see these nice folks as often as possible from now on. This place is a hidden gem!

Rob Endsley
The Outdoor Line
710 ESPN Seattle
www.theoutdoorline.com

Simple Smoke Barbequed Salmon!

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Well, you’ve spent all summer and a good part of the fall chasing -and hopefully catching- salmon and now it’s time to reap the benefits!

There are as many ways to barbeque salmon as there are barbeques… and I think I’ve seen ‘em all: Foil & fruit, butter and BBQ sauce, but my favorite is simply smoke and seasoning!

Trim the rib bones and membrane and sprinkle the filet with equal parts Lemon Pepper and Montreal Steak Seasoning. Let the mixture work into the filet for at least an hour before cooking.

So much for the seasoning, now how about the smoke? If you have access to some alder, cherry, apple or other hardwood, then you’re set. If not, it’s Peterson’s Pucks to the rescue!

Scrape the grill and spray with non-stick spray. Then slip a couple Peterson’s Pucks (alder is my favorite) under the grill -but on top of the heat- and wait for the smoke to develop.

Pre-heating the grill is a big key but don’t get it too hot! Seafood cooks much, much faster than beef or chicken and cooks at lower temps as well. Think “medium” on your grill instead of the “high” setting.

 

As the filet cooks, you’ll note a golden brown coloration start to show and the edges will curl. More importantly, observe the fish beginning to cook into the thickness of the filet.

How do you know when to flip the filet? That, my friends is the question! Look closely at the middle of the slice and if it’s close to cooked halfway through…Flip it!

Sometimes the smoke source will develop small flames. For that reason, I keep a “squirt bottle” of water nearby to douse the fire! Adding water has the side benefit of developing steam which speeds the cooking process!

The wide, metal BBQ “Spatulas” are the best for lifting the filet from the grill and supporting it during the flip. Sometimes with larger pieces of fish, two “flippers” are better than one!

 

Once you’ve executed the successful flip, you’re greeted by mouth-watering grill marks and it’s almost dinnertime!

How do you determine if your filet is done? There is a simple test you can perform to ensure the fish is cooked all the way through.

Insert a spatula or “pancake flipper” into the filet’s suture at the lateral line. If it’s done, easy pressure will allow penetration from the surface all the way to the skin.

Like I said, there are many, many ways to barbeque salmon. The above method is simple, and has one very strong recommendation: I’ve prepared salmon this way hundreds of times for friends & family and never, ever had a complaint!

It’s Oyster:30 in G-Town!

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It didn't take long to polish off 6 dozen oysters at my good buddy Geoff's going away party last night here in Gig Harbor. Geoff just got called up for 400 days of active duty in Afghanistan and what better way to send him off than with a bunch of fresh Hood Canal oysters cooked up Endsley-style on the barbecue. Oh, and a little 15 year Glenlevit scotch didn't hurt either!

My aunt and uncle have a waterfront cabin on the Hood Canal with a beach that is literally polluted with oysters. When the tide goes out the filter feeders are 18 inches think and it's nothing to pluck a couple of 5 gallon bucket-fulls for a feast. And before you accuse me of poaching oysters it's perfectly legal to take them shell-and-all from a private beach. On public beaches, however, you must shuck your limit of 18 oysters and leaves the shells on the beach to reseed the area. Not to worry, these shells will also end up back on the Endsley oyster beach where they belong.

I rustled up all the ingredients for a killer batch'a barbecued oysters before heading off to Smyth's house last night. I posted the Endsley family oyster recipe here on my Outdoor Line blog a couple of years ago and it's to die for. If you're looking for a new way to barbecue oysters…this is da bomb!  

Geoff got first dibs on the tastey oysters as soon as batch numero uno was finished. Uncle Pete called to tell Geoff thanks for his service to our country as we were gorging our bad selves on his oysters. That goes for all of us Geoff…thanks man!

These oysters usually don't make it off the barbecue. Just grab a fork and put the hammer down! If you cue up a bunch'o oysters on your barbecue make a big aluminum tray like you see in the photo below to cook them on, as the oysters juice will destroy the barbecue in a short amount of time. Oyster juice is 14,000 times more salty then reg'lur old saltwater, or so it seems.  

Montana transplant Justin and his girlfriend Bob diggin' in. Halfway thru the feast I ran out of Tillamook butter and we switched over to olive oil, which is ten times more healthy and just as tastey.

A couple of rounds of oysters actually made it past all of us vultures and into the house where the other party-goers could enjoy them.  

This is the absolute best time of year to eat oysters from the Hood Canal, as they are firm, cold, and clean during the winter months. With this recipe in your cooking quiver you can grab a cheapo portable barbecue and some local micro brews and impress your friends or family with one heckuva cookout at one of the public beaches on the Hood Canal.

And to my friend Geoff who is heading to the middle east as we speak…godspeed my friend! We'll have some oysters waiting for you when you get home safe and sound.

Rob Endsley
The Outdoor Line
710 ESPN Seattle
www.theoutdoorline.com 

Rockin’ the Shore Lunch

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Back when I was a full time river guide here in Washington one of my favorite fisheries was the Skagit River catch and release season for wild steelhead. The season was set up for March and April when the majority of those big bruisers were headed upstream and man-o-man do I have some memories from those beautiful spring days targetting America's hardest fighting freshwater gamefish.

In the early days all the scenery and all the fish in the world couldn't get people to book a trip, however, because they couldn't bonk one over the head and bring it home for supper. Catch and release steelhead fishing was a whole new dealio in this state at that time and people just couldn't grasp the thought of letting one of these awesome fish loose after landing it.

Flyfisherman had been releasing them for years, but getting a gear guy to let one go was like pulling teeth. I needed a plan.

I contacted a few of the big name guides at that time and ran my dillemma by them. One of them, whom I'm still friends with today, mentioned that he would sometimes pull over mid-day and whip up a quick bbq'd shore lunch for his guests. They loved it, of course, and always came back. That was it…a shore lunch!

I cooked all sorts of stuff on the river in those days, including chicken, steak, venison, shish-ka-bobs, and salmon. Any hot meal on the river bank was a big hit, but the salmon always got the most compliments. Salmon with a potatoe side dish and perhaps a bbq'd vegetable or some roll's…dangit that was some good stuff.

I got the cooking program so dialed in that I could have the food on the bbq in less than five minutes and have the goodies cooking while we fished our way down the river. Before long I was booked solid each and every season. I'd like to think those awesome shore lunches had a lil' something to do with it. 

I've been retired from the river guiding gig for a few years now and out of all of the days I've spent on the river it's those spring days I miss the most. So, when my good buddy Ray Gombiski sent me a text the other day to say he was in a funk and needed to get out on the water I knew a shore lunch was in order. 

This is one of the easiest shore lunches to prepare and nothing beats it on a drizzly fall day here in Washington. 

The night before the trip I cut up a mess of red potatoes and onions and place them in a baking dish. Add some cracked pepper, sea salt, and rosemary to taste and then drizzle olive oil over the whole works. Place it in the oven at 425 degrees and stir the potatoes every 15 minutes or so until they are thoroughly cooked. It usually takes about 45 minutes to get the job done. Wrap up enough potatoes in tin foil for lunch on the river and eat the rest for dinner.

Place a bunch of asparagus stalks in a Zip Loc bag and hit them with olive oil, cracked pepper, and sea salt.

Thaw out your salmon and keep it in the vacuum pack bag for the next day and pack either Tillamook butter or olive oil for the fish. One of my favorite commercially produced rubs is Tom Douglas's salmon rub and if you can't find it concoct your own rub using my Smokey Sweet Salmon Rub recipe found over on my Prince of Wales Sportfishing website.

Here's everything you need for this shore lunch: 

Rosemary Red Potatoes

Asparagus 

Salmon Fillet

Olive Oil or Tillamook Butter

Salmon Rub

Tin Foil

Plastic Forks

Paper Plates 

CHEAP BBQ

Propane

BBQ Lighter 

Newcastle Brown Ale

After the bbq is lit place the salmon in some tin foil and either drizzle olive oil over it or place a few chunks of Tillamook butter on it. Sprinkle your favorite rub on the fish and then place the potatoes and asparagus on the grill. Seal that baby up and check it in about ten minutes, or so. The salmon should be pulled off when it's medium rare, which is just about the same time the potatoes are warm and the greens are cooked. 

Place your grub on a cheapo paper plate and feel good about making comments like "I wonder what the poor folks are doing" as you scarf down every last scrap with your sophisticated plastic cutlery.

I whipped up this shore lunch for Ray and my next door neighbor Mike the other day and it topped off a perfectly awesome day on the river. Ray got out of his funk and I got to day dream about April's on the Skagit River.  

Rob Endsley
The Outdoor Line
710 ESPN Seattle
www.theoutdoorline.com

 

 

 

Spicy Salmon Sandwiches

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Every time I cook fish there is invariably some leftovers that go in the fridge and no matter how well the Zip Loc bag or Tupperware container is sealed it's nearly impossible to keep the fish from drying out. That fresh-from-the-grill taste is only attainable, well, when it's fresh-from-the-grill. With fishery closures up and down the West Coast letting any salmon and halibut go to waste is simply not an option, as if it ever "was" an option.  With this in mind I started monkey-ing around with salmon and halibut melt sandwiches a while back and came up with a combination that could possibly be the best sandwich on this planet…and possibly others.

 

Ingredients:
4 ounces cooked salmon, halibut, or other fish (salmon is my favorite)
Mayonnaise
1 or 2 diced jalapeno peppers
2 to 3 tablespoons of diced sweet onion
Pepperjack or Swiss cheese
Sourdough bread
Garlic Butter

Build the Sandwiches
Mix the salmon or halibut, mayonnaise, jalapeno peppers, and onion together with a fork like you would a tuna fish sandwich. Put the sandwiches together using either pepper jack or Swiss cheese and spread an ample amount of garlic butter on the outside of the sourdough bread.
 
Grill the Sandwiches
Light the barbeque and set the heat on it's lowest setting, giving the grill ample time to heat up. Once the grill is heated I'll usually brush the grate with olive oil, being extremely carefulnot to allow too much of the oil to fall on the open flame.  Olive oil flames up pretty good ya know! Place the sandwiches on the grill and close the lid, grilling each side for 5 to 7 minutes and remove them when each side is grilled and the cheese is thoroughly melted.  Every grill heats up differently, so the first time you do this keep a close eye on the sandwiches to keep them from burning and use a metal spatula. Just about any kind of fish works for these sandwiches and they're even good with lightly smoked fish, which adds a ton of flavor! 

Capt. Rob Endsley

www.princeofwalessportfishing.com