Fabulous Jig Bite, Great Dinner

I left Casa Loma's dock with friend and long time client Mark Tansey yesterday morning. We fished smaller sized reefs with Vegas jigs tipped with medium golden shiners. Walleyes had been in 25-30 feet for the past few day in the area we were fishing. There was almost zero walleyes in these depths. We looked around and found small tables (flatter not so steep of breaks)36-41 feet.

Once patterned it was game on. We caught walleyes slow jigging literally straight below the boat. A wind came up out of the east at about 5 mph. We anchored with my MinnKota Ipilot and casted to the back edge of the tables and used a drag, hop, hop technique and caught walleyes on almost every cast.

We ran into bonus fish also nice jumbo perch. They were biting the same Vegas jigs as the walleyes. My wife Cathie makes a Sole Meuniere using walleyes or better yet perch. Our first time having the french version was at a little restaurant in Geneva, Switzerland. They used perch (much smaller than ours) for their Meuniere. I vacuumed packed my perch for Cathie to use at a later date.

Last night we took the fresh walleyes and did the following: We took the fillets (six) and very lightly salt and peppered the fillets. I preheat my Weber Summit 660 Gas Grill to four hundred  degrees using the indirect method.

I place the walleye fillets on a grill pan that has been coated with olive oil. Drizzle the fillets with Maggi Taste of Asia Sweet Chili Sauce. Place the grill pan with fillets on the indirect heat area of the grill and close lid. Check and remove after eight minutes of cook time (you be the judge on doneness). The fish we use are usually 16"long in the round.

We make a salsa of diced red, yellow, orange and a half a jalepeno pepper per half cup of salsa. We then squeeze fresh lime juice on the mixture plus a little olive oil and mix. Salsa should be made one half to one hour before dinner. We sprinkle the salsa on the cooked fillets and it is time for a great fish dinner.

Walleye fresh off the grill with sweet chili sauce drizzled on them.

With salsa and a side of fresh home grown red and golden beets.

Mark with 25" walleye

Mike Pruett's gang comes to Rainy Lake

Mike Pruett's group arrived on Sunday evening August 26 and headed out on Monday morning August 27th. Jon Balaski, Ryan Schmidt, Matt Shermoen and Kevin Erickson were the guides for the trip. Jon, Matt, and Ryan took sandwiches with them and headed out for the day. Matt drove another party out who were friends of Mike Pruett's.

After getting them tied up Matt decided for some reason to stop at the Chairman II and visit Bernie (the Chairman chef). Bernie was not feeling well at all and Matt made him ride back to base and go to the doctor. I had just arrived back from Brainerd (dropping my son Joey off at marine mechanics school at Central Lakes College). Matt called from Bushy Head Island about two miles from base with his location and eta.

When Bernie hit the dock it was obvious that he was having fairly severe health issues, we opted to take him immediately to the hospital rather than call an ambulance. Time was important. Bernie had a heart attack and after being stabilized by the medical staff at Rainy Lake Medical Center he was life flighted to St. Mary's Hospital in Duluth Minnesota. Bernie is home getting better as we speak.

Our staff is awesome, we all felt bad for Bernie, but as soon as Bernie was taken care of Matt went right back to Chairman II and put his chef hat on for the Monday night rib fest. Matt and Jon got breakfast ready and then took the customers out fishing just as seamless as possible. I did not fish but filled in for Bernie the last two meals, nobody died from my cooking and best of all the fishing was good and everybody had a good time!

I have checked on Bernie twice since he has come home, he continues to make progress on his recovery.  

Fishing was good some on jigs, some on bottom bouncers. Jon Balaski has discovered a new cocktail that the walleyes could not resist, he wants to experiment further to make sure that it works every day.  Hopefully we will tell you more soon. 

We have four more Chairman II trips  in September. Jon Balaski is open for trips September 4 - 9. Bill Dougherty has opening Sept 3 - 5 and September  8-9th. We have some availability yet in later September. I will write about options available it is the best possible time to predator hunt, big pike and big muskies along with walleyes, and smallmouth bass. 

Chef Bernie Lessard

  

KGP Telephone and Terry Fiero

Terry Fiero's group has been coming with us on the Chairman for quite a few years. Terry is retiring later this fall and we hope he will still come on the trip with the guys. This year Jon Balaski, Ryan Schmidt, and Bill Dougherty were the guides. 

Terry and I drove the Chairman II up the lake and we moored up at Hitchkock Bay North.  Terry and I went out and scouted up a few and came back to meet the rest of the crew for shore lunch. Ryan and Jon filleted the fish, Matt cooked them (expertly as usual) and I did up the potatoes and beans.

We all headed back out after lunch and fished different reefs and humps. Walleyes are starting to hit the jig and shiners along with the slow death technique that you have read recently on this blog. We had to work a little harder than we have been but we had plenty for lunch both days (takes a few walleyes to feed fifteen for lunch each day).

The group and never any laughter!

Terry Fiero

More Palmer family joins Bruce and Lola at Casa Loma

Brett, Kristen, Isabella and Geneva, and Blake Palmer's son Everett joined Bruce and Lola for the rest of their week at Casa Loma . Jon Balaski and I did the guiding. We were planning to meet for a noon shore lunch. 

We fished with the August hot presentation bottom bouncers with slow death hooks threaded with a crawler.  We found fish on a break line that had more rock than clay and worked our way along the perimeter from 36-41 feet.

The walleyes were really active, we caught plenty of very nice 16 - 16 1/2 inch walleyes and big ones that were over the slot and had to be let go. We had four fisher-people in the boat. We ran three lines taking turns on the walleyes. Brett used my Legend Extreme spinning rod with a 1 1/2 oz. Northland Bottom Bouncer  and slow death hook. Isabella and Geneva cranked in one walleye after another for two hours and it was off to shore lunch.

We met up with Jon, Bruce, Lola, and grandson Everett for a Nelson Island lunch. We got aced out on biggest walleye, Jonnie Balaski's boat had the biggest of the morning a dandy 25 inch fish. After lunch the wind came up out of the south so we opted to fish the area south of Olson's reef on the west side of Brule Narrows.  

We found numbers of fish south of the Fox Islands and Jon found them south of Olson's reef. 

Doubles

Shore Lunch at Nelson Island