Great recipes folks!!!! I can share a couple of mine and some tips on how I fry them too. I prefer Yellow Perch, even to the crappie mentioned by big pond, the debate will live forever but to me perch are the perfect fish to eat.
I fry most all of the fish I eat, to do it properly you must have hot oil. Oil that is not hot enough will soak into the fillets, properly heated hot oil will scald the outside of the fish and turn the moisture inside the fillets to steam, and actually does the cooking of the meat.
For a dry breading I usually mix 2 cups cornmeal to 1 cup flour and add lemon pepper, about a tablespoon or so, more if you like. I make sure my fish are soaked in water, the key is to have the fillets damp so the breading sticks, I usually bread in a coffee can, put a dozen fillets in, close the lid, hold both ends and shake em up. The oil should be hot, hot, hot, if you put a drop of water in and it doesn't pop, it ain't hot enough. Fish being properly fried are noisy, lots of popping and sizzling, this is the water turning to steam and cooking the fish. You can tell when a batch of fish has fried enough by the sound, the water is steamed out and the color of the breading turns that yummy gold color. I usually just pull these out and drain them on a plate with paper towels under them, if you have a lot, like at a fish fry, get a brown papaer grocery bag, fill it with the fish, add salt and pepper, fold the bag top down and shake them around to salt them all up good.
A good beer batter is made with bisquick and beer, although when camping in Northern Quebec we used the cheap pancake mix we had along and it worked just as good. The batter is simple, add beer and bisquick, mix, batter and fry. The batter should be a little runny once mixed, like you are making pancakes. The remaining batter can be fried when the fish are all done, it's like hush puppies. Speaking of hush puppies, who has a recipe for them?
