10 awesome baits to buy from a supermarket

There are many amazing products available in supermarkets which when added to your fishing can make the difference between good sessions and amazing sessions. If you know where to look and what to look for, you’ll find everything from hookbaits, spod mixes, glugs and dips throughout any major supermarket. Not only do these all adhere to human food-grade quality, which guarantees you’re buying the best, but they also cost less than the local tackle shop saving you some serious cash.

CARPology takes a look at some of these guaranteed carp-catchers with the benefits of a little bit of scientific know-how…

Hemp oil/good oil

It’s available at Tesco for £4.99 for 500ml. A seriously good addition to any spod mix or even as a bait dip or glug, hemp oil is a carp magnet. You want the cold pressed stuff, not the refined stuff, and when you pour it on your baits your adding an oil with high nutritional value and essential fatty acids which the carp both need to stay healthy and love chowing down on too!

Thai fish sauce

Any oriental food store or the Asian aisle at your local supermarket. £1.78 for 200ml in ASDA. What is it? Basically fish sauce is a mixture of fish and salt that has fermented for anywhere between a year and 18 months. Most brands are fish, salt and water and some add sugar. You can add it to spod mixes or glug your baits in it. The fermented fish acts like Belachan, leaking off a mega attractor profile, whilst the salt sends carp into a feeding frenzy!

Oyster sauce

Get it from Tesco for £1.49 for 150ml. Why? Because it’s a superb fish attractor that soaks into boilies and makes one of the best glugs going! Salty and fishy or err… and oystery! It pulls fish in to its curious fishy food signal and makes a superb bait additive especially during the summer months when its gloopy texture frees up in warm water and sends signals out all over the lake.

Chilli puree/garlic puree

Not even a £1.00 in all supermarkets for a tube. Try adding varying levels to a bucket of particle, or for a top tip, stir a tube into cooked hemp and leave it to ferment for a day. The salt and garlic is an irresistible attractor whilst the chilli paste can be used with it or on its own. Just don’t overdo it!

Garlic cloves

Cheap as chips! Available: From any supermarket! Soak your hemp and throw in a whole bulb of garlic which you’ve broken up into cloves. Leave it to soak for 48hrs and then cook as normal. The smell is epic so get the kitchen window open or even better, cook it outside on the Coleman! Fish a clove of garlic on the Hair. Hello winter success, hello summer madness!

Marmite/yeast extract

Available from all supermarkets priced at £2.00 for a tub. They say ‘you either love it or you hate it’. We say ‘every carp on the planet loves it’! An incredible attractor, this stuff is literally rammed full of aminos and peptides (carp magnets) plus not to mention the magic ingredient that is salt. Try it all year round on your baits as a glug, dip or poured into the spod mix or bag of boilies. Amazing.

Belachan

CC Moore sell it (£2.49 for 250g) as do many Thai shops. Why use it? Because it’s made from krill, which is like fermented shrimp and carp, like many fish, are hard-wired to prey upon these tiny crustaceans. Belachan sends out a strong food signal to the carp’s brain which stirs them into a feeding mode. Rammed with aminos and full of protein, Belachan is an excellent addition especially in summer.

Brazil nuts

Tesco, £2.50 for 200g. Used sparingly, these little nuts need a 24hr soak and a half hour boil and then when mounted on a Hair can be surprisingly buoyant. Some say they get better with age so leave them in a pop-up tub fermenting for a month. Full of nutty oils and flavour, a whittled down nut and some foam plus a small bag of garlic hemp will definitely catch you big carp.

Tinned/frozen particles

60 to 90 pence a tin in most supermarkets. Need to top up your spod mix or looking to pre-bait with handy cheap particles? Try any of the pulse type veggies down the tinned aisle – the chick peas and flageolet beans are amazing. Full of flavour and nutritious, steeped in salty water and ready-to-go out the tin makes these guys a brilliant buy anytime of the year.

Peperami/Peperami Hot/Cheezie Peperami

89p in most supermarkets. Packed with spices, meaty aminos and now a spicy processed cheese variety which has as a unique hookbait with massive potential definitely deserves to be tried out. Chopped up you can pre-bait with chunks, and if you get hungry you can tuck in! Awesome and underrated, with a distinct old school cool.