Been running a experiment on freezing fish.

Used to I'd fillet em, rinse rinse rinse then put them in a bag of clean water, close, and freeze. Noticed mushy crappie way to often. Lately I've been filleting them and as I do I put the fillet in a bowl of ice water, not rinsing at all, when I'm done cleaning they go straight to a zip lock bag filled with water to freeze. Firmer fillet. When I'm ready to cook I thaw then rinse.

Maybe rinsing them and trying to "clean" it up too much was putting too much water or removing too much protection from cell damage from the freezing process... :???

Keeping them cold from start (catchin) to finish (freeze'n) could help . I always try to put fillets in ice water when cleaning. Then after rinsing , place in ziplock, add a little ice water , squeeze out air and most of water with out crushing fillets, then freeze as usual. I never have any complaints.
Some folks keep Crappie on ice too long or let die in livewells and they will turn mushy fast.

Could be... I always felt that freezing in water was the culprit. When water freezes it expands, if your soft fillets are in that water when you freeze it, seems logical to me that the pressure from the expanding water/ice would crush the fillets making them mushy. If freezing water can make potholes in asphalt roads, it's got to be tough on fish.

I vacuum pack with no water, they come out firm and fresh everytime.

Actually the freezing water is probably not creating that much pressure. It is in a bag that allows for expansion. Yep, the individual water particles could do some cell damage, but I doubt that is the issue. Too many people for too long have been storing fish in frozen water. I remember as a kid my dad's friend giving him frozen crappie in used milk cartons. Then the friend graduated to plastic bags filled with water, twisted and twist tied shut. We traded him honey since we had a honey farm.

After reading several posts on how to take care of fish, I have for the first time this spring had fish that I had frozen after thawed and fried and were as fresh as day I put them in. I used to pack in water and freeze but this past winter I dried all water I could get off fish and vacuumed the fillets and this seems to be much better in my opinion.

I would imagine vacu-sealed with no water would be best.

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Originally Posted by DrNip

I would imagine vacu-sealed with no water would be best.

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x2 - pat dry before vaccum packing

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Originally Posted by EnonEye

x2 - pat dry before vaccum packing

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x3

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Originally Posted by NIMROD

Keeping them cold from start (catchin) to finish (freeze'n) could help . I always try to put fillets in ice water when cleaning. Then after rinsing , place in ziplock, add a little ice water , squeeze out air and most of water with out crushing fillets, then freeze as usual. I never have any complaints.
Some folks keep Crappie on ice too long or let die in livewells and they will turn mushy fast.

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The most important first step is just what is said above. Clean your fish as soon as possible and keep them alive and active right up to that point. Then we fillet directly into cold water - that sets and stabilizes the meat as well as cooling it down - then wash them to get out any remaining blood. If you fillet fish that have been dead too long, you will almost certainly get mushy meat and you can feel it when you do the filleting. On ice is not anywhere near as good as butchering live fish. If you do not cool the meat immediately it will actually heat up warm enough to feel and then you also get unnecessary deterioration. The best next step though is the vacuum sealer. Those bags are heavier - lighter bags breathe too much - and there is nothing surrounding the fillets in vacuum bags to burn in the freezer either. Just be sure they are dried as carefully as possible or you will be sucking juice with your sealer and that may interfer with the seal. A quick freeze flat like on a layer of wax paper on a cookie sheet and then vacuum sealing works real well for us. They don't have to be frozen hard, just enough so there is no loose juice to get sucked into the sealer.

Awesome man thanks for the info! I normally will flash freeze if wholes