Filleting a Whole Mackerel
Two clean fillets in under two minutes, once you've done it a few times.
Mackerel is the cheapest, most abundant fish going, and it's staggeringly good for you. The catch: you need to fillet it yourself for real freshness. Learn this and you'll never eat a shrink-wrapped fillet again.
Watch a demonstration
How to Butterfly Mackerel — Stein's Seafood School
hosted by Rick Stein
How to do it
- 01
Fresh fish, cold hands
Fresh mackerel has a bright eye, firm flesh, and no fishy pong. Rinse it under cold water and pat it dry.
~1 min - 02
The gill cut
Lay the fish on its side, head to your left. Make an angled cut just behind the gill down to the backbone — but not through it.
~1 min - 03
Along the spine
Turn the knife 90 degrees and run it along the top of the backbone from head to tail in long, smooth strokes. Keep the blade flat against the bone. Lift the fillet as you go.
~2 min - 04
Flip and repeat
Turn the fish over. Same technique on the other side. You should now have two fillets and a very clean skeleton.
~1 min - 05
Pin-bone check
Run a finger along the middle line of each fillet. Any tiny bones you feel, pull them out with the tweezers, always in the direction they point.
~1 min