For top quality striped bass or "rockfish" as table fare, it's important to take care of the fish prior to cooking. The fish should be chilled on ice and laid out flat until cleaned. Once the fish is home, it can be rinsed thoroughly and filleted. Several cleaning methods exist and each angler learns their favorite style.

The fish can be scaled and the skin left on, filleted and then skinned or the skin can be cut around the perimeter of the fish and pulled off with pliers. The skin-on version is nice when baking or grilling smaller fish. Skinning the fish before filleting has some advantages, the most important being speed. Filleting the fish and then cutting the skin off removes the most dark meat and leaves the highest quality portion, although some fish is lost in the process.

Cooks have a variety of favorites for cooking rockfish. Small pieces of any size rockfish is delicious fried. Other choices include grilling, broiling, fish cakes and more. The following are a few Chesapeake Bay favorites:

Dijon Rockfish

Ingredients:

1 lb striped bass fillets

2oz. white wine

2oz. mayonaise

2oz. dijon mustard

Instructions:

This one is real simple but it's also really good.

Mix equal parts of white wine, mayonaise and dijon mustard and wisk until smooth.

Pour over fish fillets in baking dish and bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes or until done.

Lemon Butter Rockfish

Ingredients:

1 lb. striped bass fillets

1/2 fresh lemon

1 tbsp. butter

1 tsp. olive oil

1/2 tsp. Old Bay crab seasoning or equivalent

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Drain fillets and lay in a casserole dish basted with olive oil.

Squeeze lemon over fillets, drizzle with melted butter and sprinkle with crab seasoning.

Bake for 10 minutes or until fish is white on the outside and still slightly pink in the center.