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Holoholo: Omilu on raw chicken breast!

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6th grade Hunter shares another unusual catch, this time it’s the bait he used that was eye opening.

Hunter:

I was fishing down Kaneohe on Super Bowl Sunday hoping to get some fish for Super Bowl. Right off the bat, I hooked up to a solid size omaka but it came off at the net. I decided to try my luck at the uluas. Eventually I ran out of sanma so Uncle Norman gave me chicken breast. The idea sounded crazy, but he told me he caught a pao pao on Canadian bacon, so I put on the chicken breast.

At first only small papio were biting and the uluas kept coming up but turning at the last second. Then Uncle Mike came and started chumming. Then the big school of omilus came in so I dropped my bait down. After about 2 minutes I looked up to check my dunk and suddenly my line felt tight and my pole started flexing.

Note chicken hanging from its mouth

Here’s the thing about Kaneohe. To catch anything under the pier you must use lock drag or the fish will wrap you around the pillars, so fighting the omilu was basically just tug o war. After a little bit of back and forth fighting, I brought the 15 inch omilu to the surface and Uncle Norman netted it with Uncle Mike’s net.

The secret chicken bait is in the upper right hand corner

Holoholo: Heeia Fishpond La Holoholo – January 2019

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Our middle school Holoholo writer Matthew provided this catch report/safety tip/bait report to let us know we can still catch fish in January.

Matthew:
Heeia fishpond was having a fundraiser La Holoholo in January, So I signed up for it. When I got there and walked out, the first half of the pond was totally murky, with only 2 inch visibility. I was super worried, but when I got further out, the water turned clear (because of the water flow in the makahas).

I got there, with not a single bite for the first two hours, but then when the tide changed, I saw a big school of very small nehu. I put the smallest kastmaster I had, and casted outside of the pond. I got a few bumps, then looked and realized a school of Omilu was on the lure. I had a big one on, but it fell off immediately. As soon as the lure came off, a small one picked it up and I was on. It fought hard for just a little 11 incher, and I netted it after a short and feisty fight.

I kept casting it and landed a kaku on the inside of the pond, maybe around 15 inches. I then landed a kaku on the outside, around 13 inches, and tagged it. I started dunking in the inside. I then continued to whip on the outside, but got no more bites for around an hour. Then I got a blind omilu strike out of nowhere, but since I was not expecting it, I didn’t land it. I kept covering ground, and eventually got a 19 inch kaku on the outside that bent the only treble of the tiny hook I hooked it on. I changed the hooks then kept fishing.

I came back to see my dunking line all slack and leading towards the rocks. I knew it was an eel, so I locked down the drag completely and boosted it in. It was a ticked off “green head puhi”, and a fat one too, around 3.5 to 4 feet long and maybe 10 pounds. I got a pic of it, and cut the line. There was a large portion trailing out of the mouth, and I felt bad, so I reached closer to cut it. A VERY fatal mistake. The surprised eel lashed out and bit me two times. It hurt pretty bad, and I was mad so I kicked the eel very hard into the water, and then washed my hand off with saltwater. In case of an eel bite, their teeth do not inject toxin, but they have lots of bacteria on it. It is best to put pressure on the wound after washing it off and removing any teeth if they fall off. You should then put hydrogen peroxide on it and bandage it up. Keep putting ointment on it, and if it gets infected go see a doctor. The easiest way to prevent it is not to put your hands near an eel’s mouth, as this is a dumb injury. The day wasn’t worth it, but in total I tagged four more fish, bringing my total up to 53 total tagged fish. I hope to reach 80 by the end of 2019.

Bait Report
Most bait schools are gone, although there is one halalu school I still know of that’s hanging around. Early/late oama are coming in, and are very small. Wait a month or so, then they will be catching size. Small nehu are showing up everywhere and it may be a good idea to pull out the small kastmasters. The spring hatch of aholehole is happening, and a lot of those are around. Shoreline fishing is very slow with large lures, and I am catching all my fish on smaller lures now. On one trip, I got no bites at all on the big lures that killed it during the summer, but they jumped all over my small kastmaster. Yet another option again is to try smallie fishing. I like to fish for them two days after a big rain. You should also try new techniques, and I may try fly fishing during this off season. I’ve tried it before and it’s very hard, but the fight is insane. Go gettum during these hard times guys…

Holoholo: Aha (needlefish) catch and cook

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Kelly is one of our core fishing buddies and a terrific SUP fishing minimalist.  He joined Frank and me out in the deep on a calm day and sent a message to the marauding aha by keeping two to eat!

Kelly:
Since the water was malia (calm), I decided to join the ‘yak trip and see how far out I could go on my SUP while hopefully still fishing effectively. My backup plan was to troll the shallow inshore reefs for papio and awa awa. I arrived well before the latebird  ( Scott 🙂 ) so I decided to troll the inshore reef before he/Frank launched and test the inshore action. After an hour with no strikes, I saw them launching from the beach so paddled over to intercept them on the way out. The glassiness of the water and slow start inshore swayed me to tag along with the yakkers. I figured that I wouldn’t catch anything on my surface trolled oama, but it was a nice day for a paddle.

 

 

 

 

 

Well long story short, I ended up with several large `aha so decided to keep a couple for pupus (snacks). Turns out those fish are rather tasty and here are some photos of the end result. Our guests in town from Japan really enjoyed the panko `aha!

Holoholo: Big pao’pao from shore!

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Hunter is a 6th grader and fishes as often as he can.  I fished with him and his middle school crew last year, which turned out to be my last halalu outing for the year.  Here’s how we did.

Hunter wanted to share his truly exceptional catch from shore – big pao’pao, or golden trevally he caught a week before Christmas.  Thanks Hunter!

Hunter:
I was fishing in Kaneohe Bay with my Grandpa and my Uncle Dean, when my uncle’s pole went off. It was peeling line off the real really fast, and caught us off guard. We were fishing for Pualu, and it was evident that this was not a Pualu. Uncle Dean told me to start reeling in the pole, so I started to reel it in. I kept thinking throughout the fight that it was a stingray or a shark, but after five minutes, it came to the surface and felt a lot lighter and started moving around more. A little while later, it came close to us and we saw the signature golden flash of a big Pao’pao.

At this time, I was pretty exhausted and handed the pole over to my uncle to finish the job. It took a little bit of skill to get it up to us, but Uncle Al came and netted it for us.

When we got home, we weighed it and it weighed five pounds and 10 ounces. My parents were delighted to have a Pao’pao. We ate some as sashimi, and then cooked the rest. Too bad I couldn’t have caught it later for Christmas!

 

Holoholo: Big oio and yellow spot papio caught in cold shallow water on a fly

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Jason has been a shore fisherman since he could walk in the water with his dad.  He started fly fishing for oio in 2016.  He has a unique vantage point to provide fish reports since he’s standing in the water for hours looking for fish.  Here’s a short recap of a recent successful outing.

Jason:
It was a chilly and windy December morning, but I had been jonesin’ to fish all weekend, so I decided to go. The tide was also up which meant spotting the few fish that were around would be difficult, and I would be mostly blind casting.

As expected, the day started out pretty slowly. At some point i missed something that felt like a small papio, but other than that, no bites and no fish sighted. After a few hours of blind casting like a mad man, suddenly, out of the blue, I felt a subtle take, followed by a sharp tug – I set the hook and it was on! It felt like a pretty nice fish, and I must’ve wrestled with it for a good 5-7 minutes before finally bringing it to hand. A friend was about 100 yards east of me, so I waded over and got him to snap a few photos before I released the oio.

I went back to the same spot, still basking in the glow of the oio catch and thinking the day was just about over when I suddenly felt another good take. This time it felt a bit different. It ran hard, but in shorter spurts, and when brought in close, I noticed it tended to sit passively in the current, hardly moving. “papio!”, I said aloud to myself. A short while later, I brought it in close enough to see color and sure enough, I saw the electric blue outline of a nice yellow-spot papio. I had caught two around the same size in this channel about a year ago, so it seems to be a hot spot for them. Not bad action for a chilly and windy December morning…

Holoholo: Middle of December Bait and Predator Report

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Middle schooler Matthew provided this status report since I haven’t checked the shoreline scene in a while. Much Mahalos, Matt!

Matthew:
Over the past few weeks, I have noticed that fishing has gotten a lot slower. A few baitfish here and there are still around, but the nehu schools have vanished, as well as almost all of the late oama and the halalu. An interesting sight now are schools of moilii, or baby moi. These are around the island in tidepools and shallow areas.

Most of the papio are gone, but if you somehow have live oama for bait, dunking in a channel may produce one.  Kaku are still around, but just not in the levels they were in the summer. Whipping along the shoreline with small lures such as spoons, grubs, and small jigs may work now, as there really isn’t much big bait. Oio bites are getting more common though, and a few big ones have been brought up this week so far by baitcasters.

 

 

Another bad factor is that the days are getting really short, which means less time to fish. What I have been doing recently though, is going stream fishing for smallies (smallmouth bass). I ended catching my first one, and the fight is pretty similar to a papio. The smallies appear to not be affected by the changing seasons. If you do have a boat, now would be a good time to use it, as fish are moving to deeper waters along with the baitfish. If you can catch a few live opelu, you are pretty much set to catch a big papio or ulua with it, as well as other predators. Opelu, however, are getting plentiful, so that is a plus.

Holoholo: Fish and Dive Expo 2018

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7th grader Matthew generously shares his Fish and Dive Expo experience with us. His mother was his in-the-field photographer.

Matthew:

 

 

 

 

 

The Hawaii Fish and Dive expo… Rumored to be the biggest fishing event in the Hawaiian Islands every two years. I heard some people even flew in from other islands to come to it. Starting off the bat, getting there and watching the fish in the man made pond is always frustrating, but is also fun to watch all of your dream fish swimming side by side. After you finally get in, there is usually a mad rush for the Campania Lures booth. Especially this year because they were selling a very realistic looking oama soft bait, and were only selling ten each day of the expo. The price on the oama lure was 15 dollars each, and you only got one bait per package. A little pricey, but I thought I would try and get it anyways. As soon as I went through the gate, I sprinted to the Campania booth… But instead ended up at the bathrooms. Oops, wrong isle. By the time I ran back to the right isle, there was a hefty line, and by the time I got to the front, it was sold out. I still bought some other goodies from the Campanis booth including some new colors. They had made a new color just for the expo called “El Richie”.

The J.Hara booth had some good deals too, including a closeout sale of Maria’s “Ma-Worms” which is an interesting looking grub. They were selling it for an absurd price of 10 packs for $1! They charged me $10 instead of $1, but that was still fine since even if they sold it for $1 each, the normal price per pack was $5. They were also selling Maria hard lures (Jig-like things, crankbaits, and jerkbaits similar to Yo-Zuri ones) for only $2 each! I bought two that looked a lot like an oama. They also had a good deal for a long net for $8.99.

 

 

I also checked out the Hanapa’a booth, and they had discounted rod holders, J-Line, and reels including the Daiwa Saltist I had heard about from my friend. I checked out some other booths that sold some Ulua Poppers, stickbaits, and jigs, including discounted micro-jigs in sardine color, so I bought one for $4.99.

 

 

I also checked some other booths out, but nothing really appealed too much to me, so I checked out the Tag-It booth. I met Uncle Clay, talked to him a little bit, and then left to wander a little bit more.

I then checked out Uncle Kevin at the Hobie and (I think?) Bloody Yaks booth. He had his giant kayak on display! It looked to be around 25 feet long, bigger than the average small boat. Overall, this year’s expo was better than 2016’s one. This was clearly an event that you can’t miss once it comes up especially when compared to the only other “fishing” expo, the Ocean Expo.

 

 

 

Fish Status:
Oama are definitely thinning out, with almost all of the traditional spots barren. There are a few spots which I will not name that I have seen new, “dumb” oama that just came in, so this may be the last “wave” before they all leave, so get your Oama now and stock up. Halalu are pretty much gone by now, with only the late season spots holding some, like Haleiwa, Waimea, and Kahe Power Plant. Campbell may have some, but I hear it’s mainly blind casting over there. Kewalo has been barren of Akule for a good 4 months now, and may come back soon. Sardines are all gone now, with maybe a pile scattered here and there, but not much any more. There may be some in deeper water that you can catch off damashi and kayak. Iao and Nehu are still in abundance, but are getting quite larger, which is attracting larger predators, but also means that they may leave the safety of the shallows soon. Another strange abundance I have been seeing is Mullet (not sure if they are Uoa’uoa or Ama’ama) all ranging from three inches to six or so inches. Sometimes there is even a large ball of mullet I see. It may be worth a shot to try snag one then toss it out past the school. Bait season is ending, so Papio and Omilu are starting to head back into deeper water, so try and get them soon.

Holoholo: Heeia Fishpond – Trial 7

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7th Grade Matthew’s mature, insightful writing style continues to impress.  This time he blesses us with a recap of his most recent Heei’a Fishpond Holoholo Day outing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Matthew:
Note: I have fished this place six times before and this will be my seventh time trying it. In the past I have caught Moi, Kaku, Toau, and Papio over here. There seems to be an abundance of Toau and Kaku mostly though, all feeding on Ama’ama or Nehu. In the past I have had both good days and bad days, and found that the tide is a key factor.

I had signed up for a Heeia Holoholo day, because I thought that the old heeia story posted by Scott in 2015 was long outdated and needed another story to give more info on the pond. I got to the fishpond at 8:15am, where before the introduction I caught some opae with a net and put them in our bucket. We did a little introduction to everyone fishing at the event, then headed off to go fishing. I immediately got my stuff and fast walked the ½ mile to the fourth makaha. I set up, got my oama on, sight casted a kaku, and, screamer! Of course, it snapped the line after. I set up another oama rig and went to the third makaha. There I saw a school of around 10 kaku and a few good sized omilu cruised by once in a while. What were they there for? I soon saw my answer as I spotted some large nehu school in the deep section of the area. They all did not bite my oama at all, but that was about to change soon.

The current stopped and all of a sudden, the kaku started eating everything I threw at them, even lures. In that brief 20 minute period, I tagged 9 kaku and missed many more. The person next to me landed a few papio, and a few kaku in that time also. Then, like a magic switch, the fish all of a sudden stopped biting. I could still see them there, but none were even looking at my lures or oama. I eventually gave up, and this is where the opae came in handy. I used the opae and caught a nenue, kupipi, and many toau on the opae. It seemed like the less desirable fish were still willing to bite, at least. My friends that I invited, Jesse and Jayden, were having fun with the toau and kupipi also, who were also disappointed that the Kaku bite had shut down. We fished for the remainder of the time for toau, and then sadly, our day ended very quickly. We headed back and made a few casts along the way, but nothing came out of this last ditch effort for a Papio. We said our goodbyes to Jesse and Jayden, as well as the Assistant Executive Director, Kelii. This was a good day with many Kaku, and hopefully one of them will get captured.

Overall Fish Status: Oama are still here, but get them before they get big and move past the reef. It is best to find a new and “dumb” pile instead of the larger, smart ones. Sardines are still around, but are much less preferred than the oama, unless you are fishing around a sardine pile, which then live sardines would work. Halalu are around, but many spots have been netted, so keep your halalu spots as quiet as possible. Larger fish are coming to hit the piles, and even pelagics in some select spots. Akule appear to be hanging around in a few spots also. Nehu and Iao are littered around the shoreline, so if you see a small pile, it may be a good idea to cast right past the pile and see if a predator is waiting.

Holoholo: Oama still around, papio still whacking them!

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Holo holo SUP fishing (again)

Hi Scott,
Some fat oama are still around and the live oama you gave us were ACTION JACKSON!
A couple of weekends ago we went in inside the waves on the south shore of Oahu and had a blast! I took home three 3-pound omilu and a couple of 2-pounders and one 2 pound roi. My partner got a few small papio and a small barracuda. Didn’t get very good pics, but here is a shot of some of the catch before cleaning. The papio were all caught in the morning, near the top of a 1.9’ high tide and all fish had empty stomachs. We made sashimi, nanbanzuke, vina dos, and some chiri (soup). My wife is a good cook and it was all sooo onolicious!
Shoots,
Kelly

Holoholo: Oama fail to oama success!

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7th grade Matthew continues to get better at the various shore fishing disciplines despite often fishing alone and without experienced fishers to learn from.  With just a few basic oama tips he really improved his oama game. I’ve never oama fished with Matthew so he hasn’t seen how lousy I really am and why I need good bait.

Matthew:
I have always had trouble with oama fishing, so I decided to basically quit. My first few tries resulted in failures. Often I would even find an oama school nobody else was fishing and then fail too. Finally, I got some, but with only 3 in a few hours. I got discouraged by this and I had quit oama fishing for a good 2 years or so. But then I met Scott, the oama master. He had a ton of oama knowledge and he told me I should try again. I thought maybe, but later.

After unstoppable nagging from Scott to try again, I decided to try a popular oama spot for an hour. I used cut fish, and chummed some right before I dropped my splitshot into the water. I hooked one on the first drop, but I was so surprised that I forgot to set the hook! I kept trying and surprisingly, got 12 at the end. By then I was itching to go again, but Hurricane Lane started to plow towards us.

I decided to chance it on Saturday and met up with Hunter at another spot. This was my first time fishing this spot, and I wasn’t really planning to go oama fishing, so I had to use his shrimp. It worked ok at first, landing 4 oama in 10 minutes, but then the bite really slowed, and I wasn’t smart enough to go to the other pile that was biting. I then filleted up a fish and used that for bait, ending up with 12-ish more oama. I, however, was convinced to go back the next day, and I had a different plan, I filleted the bait up and cut it into pieces before the trip and put it in a container. I also made an oama board out of a boogie board, fishing line, duct tape, and an upside down stepping stool. One person there even said “It is the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen, but it works!”.

I went to the same spot the next day, and found a pile that wasn’t biting but had a lot and nobody was fishing it. I remembered something that Scott said and tried to chum the school, almost immediately after the chum hit the water, the sitting oama turned into frenzied oama. I lowered my bait and immediately it got hit. Man, these things fight hard. I kept pulling up oama after oama until the others fishing the non biting pile noticed I was getting bites, so they came over and fished it with me. Still repeating the process, chum, lower bait, catch an oama. I eventually had to leave though, and I left Hunter, Issey, and Cade to finish off strong.

This was my best oama day ever, and I ended up with a massive 45!! Almost my limit! That is amazing for me! For a guy who is used to catching 3 oama per 8 or so hours, catching 45 in 2 hours was a miracle. Much thanks to Scott for turning my Oama luck around! He was right about bait being everything in Oama fishing! I plan to go back to that same spot later and test a new theory soon too.

Holoholo: SUP fishing with oama

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My SUP fishing friend Kelly has guest posted in the past and started off the Holoholo section.  He consistently brings home the kau kau fish during the oama season and also during the “off season”.  I shared 9 live oama with him that he used for his Maunalua Bay outing.  He forgot his Flow-Troll bait bucket that day and had to keep a 5 gallon bucket from tipping over on the deck of his SUP!

Kelly:
Hi Scott,
My friends and I have been capitalizing on the late oama run on Oahu and using them outside of shorecasting range to catch papio and some other oddballs. Two weeks ago we went in the Waikiki area and I got a 3-pound omilu and a couple of 2-pounders. Sorry no pics, because went in my opu fast.

Omilu and taape filets

Opihi and lomi awa awa

 

 

 

 

 

 

Raw awa awa fish balls

Fried awa awa fish balls

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last week we went in Maunalua Bay (thanks for LIVE OAMA!) and I got a 3-pound awa awa, 5 small omilu (1-2 pound, best kine fo’ grine) and two ta`ape. The ta`ape had eggs, so was good to take them off the reef. Ate those fish fast kine, but managed to get pics of the fileted fish, lomi awa awa and cooked patties for you.
K-den,
Kelly

Holoholo: Junior angler’s halalu season so far

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I met Issey 2 weeks ago, as he was relishing his last few weeks of summer before starting the 8th grade. He had been fishing for 2 years and was already a very accomplished, yet humble halalu whipper in that short period of time. I asked Issey to describe his second halalu season so far.

Issey:
It was a nice sunny, bright day with days counting down till school starts. I heard rumors about the sardines and halalu in one of my places so I decided to check it out with a buddy.

In the distance, I saw people fishing but I wasn’t too sure if they were just whipping for big game or sardines/halalu. I waded my way towards the anglers and the anglers were catching plenty sardines and halalu.

I quickly set up my pole with a strip and walked out to the pile. I had plenty of bites but somehow they broke off while reeling them in. Slowly getting stressed, I managed to pick up the trick and after that I caught plenty. I ended up with 18 sardines and 13 halalu which I think is pretty good with strips.

 

 

 

I went everyday after that successful day. Eventually I noticed that big fish were whacking the pile so I threw out a dunk and managed to catch my first hammerhead shark. Also had a nice screamer free-lining a halalu. However, it broke off soon after it screamed.

Please follow my IG – @issey.abae

Holoholo: 1st ono off Big Island kayak

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Jorden and his wife Dominique have actively supported PIFG’s Tag It program with beautiful photos of their tagged papio/ulua for use in the Lawai’a magazine.  They’ve been kayak fishing off the Big Island for about a year, targeting bigger and better fish. I’ve asked Jorden to describe his most recent kayak fishing accomplishment so Frank and I can prepare for the deep water pelagics.

Jorden:
My wife and I launched our 13 ft Hobie Outbacks from shore around 9:00am. After trying for small inshore game for bait with little success, we decided to head out to deeper waters for pelagic species before the winds picked up. At about the 100 ft depth I pulled out the largest frozen opelu I had, which was hooked on my pre-made leader set-up that included 6ft of 80 lb Yo-zuri topknot fluorocarbon leader with a 7/0 live bait hook put through the head, which was connected to 7 inches of 120 lb Malin wire attached to a 4/0 treble hook that I attached near the posterior end of the bait. This leader set-up was connected to the mainline on a 5 1/2 ft Seeker trolling rod/Shimano TLD 30 loaded with 200 yd of 200 lb braid and about 150 ft of 80 lb mono for some stretch.

I let out about 75-100 ft of mono and began trolling. After about an hour or so of trolling and no action I decided to do a bait check by giving the rod a couple of pulls and BANG! The reel screamed off about 25 yd of line, then slowed. I began to fight the fish which felt nice and heavy. A couple more solid runs then nothing….. I reeled in about 30 ft of slack line and then the reel started screaming again. After a few similar situations of the fish running away then towards the kayak, the fish started circling the kayak. As the fish approached the kayak it gave one more run and then I finally saw color… A long shiny spearhead shape appeared and I knew immediately that it was an ono, which I’ve wanted to catch for 20 years. I pulled out my kage and with one shot, speared the fish perfectly and the fight was over.  It’s quite a feeling to have a fish like this lay across your lap.

I feel extremely fortunate to have landed this fish given that it had completely swallowed both hooks, but didn’t cut through the leader. The rudder and mirage drive system on the Hobie was clutch, which enabled me to adjust the kayak to best fight the fish. Not only did this fish provide an awesome experience, but also provided us with weeks worth of ono food.  We didn’t weigh it, but guess it weighed somewhere around 35lb.

Holoholo: Yellow dot papio mini catch & cook

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Kelly has guest posted a few of his unusually large SUP catches in the past. He kicks off our new Holoholo Anykine section with a short yellow dot papio catch report and great recipe.

If you’re interested in posting your catch, please let us know through the Contact page.  Can be much shorter than this. Picture, brief description of catch, general location and method used.

Kelly:

Aloha fellow fishers! Two Saturdays ago was a day after the full moon and my only free day, so I decided to do some standup fishing on the East side of Oahu, although my expectations were low due to the apparently poor moon phase. The tide was 1.0 and rising 2.0’ in the afternoon so I took my time and arrived at the secret fishing spot at 3:00pm. I figured I would just paddle around and get some exercise but no tan, since the day was pretty overcast.

Only 15 minutes after launching, as I was nearing an area in about 6-8 feet of water where I thought there may be a few papio lurking, I got a subtle nibble and set the hook. To my surprise the fish took off and headed towards deeper water. Fought the fish for what seemed long but was probably 2-4 minutes and landed this nice 3.4 pound yellow spot papio! YAY! My fave to eat sashimi style!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My parents and I had a nice papio dinner with steamed fish and sashimi. If anyone wants the recipe for a tasty steamed fish with easy cleanup, here it is:

• Whole fish 2-3 lbs best size, freshness is paramount
• Sliced ginger
• Ti leaf and foil
• Salt/pepper
• Green onions (optional)
• Peanut oil (optional)

The sauce is what makes the dish. ½ cup shoyu, ½ cup water, sliced ginger & sugar to taste. Optional: chili pepper flakes (I use the Pizza hut dry kine, about 1/3 of the packet ‘cause easy), garlic (sliced), 2 tsp mirin, honey. Bring to a boil, then thicken with about 1 tsp cornstarch.
Clean fish, slice as shown and put ginger slivers in cuts, as shown. Place ti leaf on foil and put fish on top. Sprinkle a pinch of salt and pepper. Wrap well, so no liquid/steam can escape. Place in 450 degree oven on cookie sheet for 30-45 minutes. Use a fork to poke and see if done. Fork should go to the bone easily, with less resistance than poking a boiled egg, almost as easily as a hot knife through butter. If unsure, open foil and poke in thickest spot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

When done, take out and slide ti leaf onto large platter. Pour on sauce and top with smoking hot peanut oil. Sprinkle on green onions and GRIND!