Curing Salmon Eggs

Finding the perfect recipe or process for curing salmon eggs can be both difficult and frustrating, but it can also be a ton of fun. One of the toughest parts about dialing in successful egg cures for salmon is dialing in the process. You can have the best recipe, but if it isn’t done properly it is likely your bait still won’t fish well. This article will cover a thorough step-by-step process to follow while curing salmon eggs and some quality cures to start with. 

First, we will cover the process I follow to cure my salmon eggs from start to finish. In order to end up with good bait, you have to start with good bait. Bleed your fish! Getting all of the blood out of your eggs is extremely important if you want to end up with good bait. The most effective way to accomplish that is by cutting the piece that is in between the two sets of gills, pulling a gill out with a set of pliers is also sufficient. 

Next, remove the eggs out of the fish before filleting and place them in a ziplock bag, keep them dry and clean. You can wait up to 48 hours before curing your skeins, it is best to wrap them in paper towel if you are going to do so. Next is the actual curing process. 

Curing Salnon Eggs

I start by laying my skeins out on chicken wire or something similar, metal shelves work great too. We want to start drying the skein out prior to putting cure on it. I will flip them back and forth if necessary until they slightly tacky or sticky to the touch. Once dry enough I have clean and labeled ziplocks ready, write your cure or recipe on the bag until you have a process down. It is now time to apply your cure, latex gloves are great for this. I start by lightly sprinkling over the egg side of the skein and pull back each “flap” as I am sprinkling the cure on to it. You do want to be careful as you can use too much and burn your eggs. The best way I can use to describe it is like salting a steak, that being said every cure is a bit different. Some requiring more and some requiring less. I then gently rub the cure around to try to evenly spread it out but also to jump start the process. From here they are placed into your bags. Leave them out at room temp for 12-24 hours, roll them or flip them every few hours to ensure an even color and cure. You will start to see liquid accumulating in the bag, this is both normal and good.

After room temp they are placed in the refrigerator for another 12-24 hours. The salmon eggs will reabsorb all or most of the liquid that was in the bag. Go back to the chicken wire or shelves and your skeins back out to dry, if they are very wet I will pat them dry with a paper towel. From here, there are variables as everybody has different preferences on their eggs. I let them dry for a while, timing depends on if I want wet or dry cured eggs. From here they go to a clean and labeled ziplock and borax is added accordingly depending on how I want my finished egg to be. Start very light, you can always add more!

That is the entire egg curing process, it takes time to get consistent and good as every skein is a bit different so don’t get frustrated. Take notes so you know what does and does not work!

Finally, we will cover a few good base cures to start with and then it is time for you to start curing up that special batch of bait. There are a very wide variety of different cures on the market these days and I encourage you try as many as you can, you just might find one that works very well for you that isn’t frequently fished. That being said, here are a few to start with. Pautske Fire Cure, Boraxofire and pro cure egg cure, these are all effective and fairly easy to work with. Have fun with the process and don’t be afraid to try something different!

John Wielinga

Owner/Head Guide

www.getbentguideservicemi.com

269-277-9293