Some of the best Saturday shore lunches I have eaten have started with a Tuesday. Tuesdays my butcher told me is thee day to shop at the local market. All lasts weeks old stuff has been bought and the new stuff is being put on the shelf. So On Monday I get to thinking up a grocery list. I let that list simmer all day. Then when I think it’s rendered itself into some potential I take it with me the next day to grab the premeditated grub.

My butcher is one smart guy. On Tuesday all those shelves are full. First I need some snow white lard. Livings bad for my health, so I get the good stuff. Frying potatoes in lard makes them spuds golden brown. The fish just crisp up and after the fillets drain off the flavor is still there. Lard sticks with you for a long time. It hardens my arteries not to have at it along. My fish are usually pretty heavy and some of those light oils don’t hold up to well during my frying.

I need onions. Breakfast lunch and dinner camping without onions is not allowed north of the 46th parallel. Look it up. It’s in the chapter about Northwood’s camping, section titled, onions for dummies. To be sure, I read it twice. Just the smell of onions frying brings a tear to many eyes. A bag of sun hung warmed onions will make a loon cry. I have heard them wailing many times when I’m cooking lunch.

Here’s a savvy woodman’s tip some of you may not know. You know how you get all of the water out of the potatoes. You cut up one strong yellow onion and mix that in with the potatoes and hot lard. Potatoes have all kinds of eyes, once those spuds start frying them eyes start cryin and Walla, that waters out of your potatoes. It’s in the chapter spuds for duds. Look it up.

If you can fish as well as I can fish, you may want to bring some kielbasa just in case the lake you picked doesn’t have any fish. I have been on two of those lakes in my lifetime. Yesterday all kinds of fish, then suddenly overnight it got over fished and all those fish have been eaten by mink, turtles, otter, Bigfoot, loons perhaps eagles and maybe some lucky fisherman. Shoulda been here yesterday lake is up there in the bwca and it’s a hard lake to find but its there. The problem is, it’s not named that on the maps. Sometimes it’s called long lake or bad lake or three Rivers Lake just to confuse you and me so keep your eyes peeled. It’s another reason to bring onions; they keep your eyes refreshingly clear.

Lets say your not on shoulda been here yesterday lake and your on walleye way. Well the main course needs its own special coating. I tried mixing my own and decided after a few years there are people with nothing better to do than create tasty tantalizing batters from a dry mix I can’t screw up, so I buy them on Tuesday also. The boxes that don’t have professional fisherman on the cover actually cost less and taste better based on my own personal study. I read the ingredients a few times over and its amazing how similar one box two dollars cheaper tastes the same in a hot skillet with fresh fish. The guys I fish with tell fewer tall tales without a pro likeness in camp too. Present company included.

So you got Wednesday and Thursday to get the boat ready. Air up tires and fix the anchor rope. Friday you call in sick and hit the road. Saturday you fish and then fry. Hopefully in that order since Saturday only comes once a week. I can’t tell you about Sunday dinners until I read the next chapter about Sunday pot roast dinners for dummies. The book says not to read that chapter until autumn. I'm a slow reader so it may take me until next fall to get that far. But I bet it has something to do with getting to your grocer on Tuesday. Look it up.

The trout whisperer

Karl "Trout Whisperer" Seckinger is a respected JustNorth author and outdoor adventurer. His guide service, DuNord Guide Service, and the trout waters that he fishes in the Superior National Forest, are some of the most tightly guarded secrets among Trout enthusiasts in Minnesota and Wisconsin.

Contact Karl at 218 - 525 - 0442 or write to him at:

DuNord Guide Service - 6999 Culbertson Road, Two Harbors, Minnesota 55616

Learn more about DuNord Guide Service in the JustNorth MarketPlace.