Shag Lake + Two People + Another Dog + Smoked Fish

Wendy, Brian and Tucker arrived late Thursday night. Harlan planned to accompany them, but work interfered. Since Dad and I had the place to ourselves (plus Bowser) for over a week, we were ready for some company. They brought a smoker, cooler temperatures and rain. But with rain, comes rainbows:

Frist, we had a some work to do. Primarily we had to pull out two sections of the dock as requested by Roy:

Wendy upgraded the camp menu with some tasty treats like Cowboy Caviar and Caprese Flatbread:

First priority was smoking our Northern Pike haul. As noted in a previous post, we have been catching our fair share of pike.

Although a boney fish, we pretty much keep everything we catch because:

1. Northern Pike are an invasive species in this lake and shouldn't be there. 
2. We fillet the big ones and smoke the small ones. 

This will be our third smoking effort. I remembered the drill and got things started the night before they arrived. After filleting, the fish go into a secret brine recipe to marinade overnight.

Okay, it's not so secret. After Brian and team arrived they were ready to go on the drying racks for another 6-8 hours:

No Tucker. Bad dog! Not this time! 

Finally, into the smoker:

Yes, they are as good as they look. We enjoyed them over a couple of days.

Breakfast of Champions:

Fried egg, fried potatoes, fried and smoked fish.

Yooper Surf and Turf:

Smoked pike with venison sausage, wild rice pilaf and Two Hearted Ale.