Bluefish flesh is a medium color and distictly flavored but not nearly as strong as mackerel. There is a narrow dark strip down the centerline of the fillet which has a stronger flavor but that can easily be removed if your taste in fish is, umm . . . "refined".

Fillets can be cooked by any method and hold together well but flake apart easily on the plate. The flesh is very tender when raw but cooks up quite firm, but not objectionably firm. I consider this an excellent eating fish.

I particularly like fillets lightly dusted with rice flour and pan fried. This seems an ideal fish for that method, with sufficient flavor not to be overwhelmed by the oil but not so much as to be offensive.

This fish is covered with smallish and rather thin scales that are easy to scrape off and don't fly around much as you do so. The fish is fairly easy to fillet and yield is good with a 1-1/2 pound fish yielding 12 ounces of skinless fillet (50%). Fillet carefully because the flesh is very tender and flakes apart easily when raw.

With bluefish it's easy to have bone free fillets, but you will find some substantial centerline spines for the first 1/4 of the fish, remove them pulling straight forward.

The skin shrinks quite a bit when fried but it isn't the easiest fish to skin. The flesh is tender and the skin is also thin and tender. Again, use care and expect a few fragments of skin remaining - they do no harm. The head, fins and bones make a medium flavored stock quite usable for soup.