While I have experimented with many different fishing methods and used many types of baits, including a piece of foam on a treble hook; grasshoppers, real flies (I had a really hard time catching the dangerous thing on the hook, not to mention how often it flew, no pun intended, when I cast); to artificial lures or standard live baits such as worms, usually along with marshmallows or something that would help the worm out of the bottom and into the feeding area. Some of my biggest successes have come from using a “secret ingredient” with my Velveeta Cheese.
On a fishing trip with a friend of mine more years ago than I can count, he suggested we try a new approach that he had heard about from a “friend of a friend”. So we went to the local grocery store, bought a two-pound block of Velveeta cheese, and a bottle of the “secret ingredient” that we took home. We spent the next couple of hours eating tacos his wife made and cutting the two-pound block of cheese into bait-sized pieces. After we were done with the bait and tacos, not necessarily in that order, we poured the entire one ounce bottle over the cheese, put it in a sealed container for the night.
The next day we headed to Willow Beach on the Colorado side of Arizona; a popular catch for those who like to catch the big ones. There were six men in our group of two boats. In my boat we had the secret bait. The other ship did not. Within two hours of going out on the water, our boat had caught our limits of ten fish each using the secret bait. The other boat had exactly three fish and they were all small. Ours, on the other hand, averaged over two pounds each. We were fishing the same waters using essentially the same drift method with the bait suspended a few feet off the bottom. When we landed for breakfast and showed the others our catch, we were forced to spill the beans or risk a long swim in the mighty Colorado. We think of the easy way out. Then the second boat set off and, using the secret homemade bait, had its limits at noon. For the next ten years we fished regularly together and were always successful with our homemade bait. We let a few people in on the secret, but most thought it was silly and refused to try. His loss, I’m sure.
When Powerbaits appeared and forever altered the tackle boxes of countless anglers, it was only a matter of time before our secret ingredient fell by the wayside. Considering the cost of cheese which has tripled in the last thirty years and the waste caused because one cannot use the cheese for anything else once it has been soaked and one can see why it fell out of favor. Plus, it’s much easier to just open a bottle of Powerbait and pull out an appropriate portion to use as bait. So… our secret ingredient: anise seed oil, more commonly known as licorice oil, went the way of the dodo. Still, from time to time I wonder if I shouldn’t give it a try, especially when the fish don’t bite at all.
There you go. Liquorice oil and Velveeta cheese. Ironically, no other processed cheese seemed to work as well. We tried some spicy Velveeta once and managed to catch some very good “Latin” trout. Still, if you’re not having any success, consider giving this one a try. It doesn’t hurt and you can always use the leftover cheese to make a great chili cheese sauce.