Smoking Meat...

[Crusty]

If your that worried about cold smoking just hot smoke. And 24hrs seems a long time in the fridge, old school guy I know who cold smokes in an old outhouse on his farm, and what I've read and personal experience tells me that 12 hours is enough and NOT to refrigerate any longer then that, can't remember why but it's got something to do with the rub/salts/sugars sucking all the good moisture out if the meat in a cold environment, I think.

Someone on here may know better though.

I don't want to cook the Salmon, I want it cold smoked & eat it raw, well lox or cured.
I meant to say 12hrs in the fridge for the Pelicle. The Smokai produces a fairly cool smoke but in a confined area for at least six hours, heat is something you will need to be concerned about. The Salmon will still be edible, but you won't be able to thinly slice it & too much heat will just make it crumble & fall apart.
This is what I want to do.

 

[Ciderman]

How do u ignite the thing?
Im intersted. Would be good to turn my Aldi smoker into a cold smoker also.

Butane gas torch

 

[Ciderman]

I don't want to cook the Salmon, I want it cold smoked & eat it raw, well lox or cured.
I meant to say 12hrs in the fridge for the Pelicle. The Smokai produces a fairly cool smoke but in a confined area for at least six hours, heat is something you will need to be concerned about. The Salmon will still be edible, but you won't be able to thinly slice it & too much heat will just make it crumble & fall apart.
This is what I want to do.

Yep, totally agree. There are so many recipes out there it's hard to say what works best unless you try them all. 24 hours was fine for me. By the same token your smoke machine produces quite a lot of smoke so you will probably find it won't need much time. With such a delicate natural flavour you don't want to over smoke it. Choice of wood is very important too. I used beech wood.

 

[Crusty]

Yep, totally agree. There are so many recipes out there it's hard to say what works best unless you try them all. 24 hours was fine for me. By the same token your smoke machine produces quite a lot of smoke so you will probably find it won't need much time. With such a delicate natural flavour you don't want to over smoke it. Choice of wood is very important too. I used beech wood.

Beech chips & 6hrs should be plenty of time. The hotter the temp the less time you have up your sleeve & as you said, it's such a delicate flesh & I want to be careful not to ruin it. I was hoping the fridge idea might be the ideal solution to do a run when I feel the urge rather than waiting for better ambient temps.

 

[shaunous]

Sorry lads, never cold smoked Salmon, and probably never would. Not a bit fan. I took your posting as that's what you wanted to do for all meats.

Discard my poor advice

 

[Crusty]

Sorry lads, never cold smoked Salmon, and probably never would. Not a bit fan. I took your posting as that's what you wanted to do for all meats.

Discard my poor advice

All good brother..... :beerbang:
I've got a hot smoker but tryng to find the ideal cold smoker for the Salmon.
The temperature is critical & for a really good smoke flavour, you need at least 6hrs & you need to keep the fish under 20deg ideally. The lower the temp the better. We get some pretty cold nights & mornings here through winter as you would know just being up the road from me but timing the smoke day is a *****.
I might do a night time run from 6 till midnight when it cools down. There's some cold weather on the way so it might be the time to have a go shortly. Cold smoking is a shitload harder to get right compared to hot smoking but if you like Salmon in the packets from the supermarket, doing it @home ***** all over the store bought stuff & well & truely worth the hassle.

 

[shaunous]

Yeh im hearing ya, currently down to 4*c but still up to 20*c of a day time, gotta love our massively weather changing little valley

Maybe i'll revisit my taste for smoked raw salmon, to be honest i've only had it once, and that was the morning of a good mates wedding after a big night on the booze many years ago. My tastebuds, if there were any left at the time have probably moved on :lol:

 

[Steven @ Home Make It]

what I've tried of cold smoking

the fun part is trying to
to keep the smoke in
but not let the temp build up
only one attempt so far
need to revisit the process soon

 

[Danwood]

Mead-soaked hickory smoked pork ribs.

Onion, garlic and rosemary cornbread.

Pretty bloody good y'all !

 

[Danwood]

Rolled pork leg roast.

Scored the fat then scalded it with boiling water to shrink and expose the cuts.
Dried, salted, then left in the fridge overnight, uncovered.
Smeared with dijon mustard and then a dry rub consisting of brown sugar, smoked paprika, thyme, sage, onion and garlic powders.

I'm hot smoking it for 2 hrs with mead hickory then cooking for probably another 6-8 or so. All at around 110°C.

Then crank all the burners up to crackle the fat at the end.

As a side project, there's a few almonds being smoked with a regular basting of maple syrup, smoked ground chilli and salt.

Nothing too fancy, only done on the bbq, but hopefully it'll be good.

 

[Steven @ Home Make It]

looks good
I do mine with a bit of cajun spice as well
yummy

 

[Danwood]

Awwwright !

 

[seamad]

Some Canadian Bacon from the Ruhlmann book

Smoking tube fired up. Mixture of cherry and red box pellets


Added some ice bricks to stop temps rising. Cold smoked for 5 hours with no increase in temp.


After the cold smoking lit the charcoal and threw in some red box chunks. Kept smoker at 110C , took about 4 hours to reach 65C internal


Whilst smoking had a beer and some pork scratchings from the removed rind


Bacon. Very tasty. Better than the dry rubbed belly bacon from the Ruhlmann book.

 

[philmud]

A couple of pork hocks sitting in brine. I'm going to pop them in the smoker this morning.

 

[barls]

just got my smokai. now to fit it up

 

[scon]

Ah, I forgot about this thread - we got another pig and have been curing and smoking a fair bit lately.

Smoked Hocks:

And a wet brined smoked ham:

Bonus pic of some sausages and guanciale curing under the house (there now is a fly-screen around the lot after an unfortunate maggot infestation with my last batch):

 

[philmud]

Did you smoke those hocks with any kind of rub scon?

 

[scon]

No rub, they were brined together with the ham for four days and then cold smoked followed by hot smoked with cherry wood - the ham was then roasted with a glaze made up of brown sugar and pineapple juice (which stupidly I forgot to take a picture of).

I used the instructions here as an overall guide and used meatheads pickling mixture here for the flavouring for the brine. Both come heartily recommended.

 

[scon]

Oh and try and make sure your hocks are out of the brine and in the fridge for about 12 hours uncovered before you smoke them so you get a nice pellicle on them for the smoke to stick to.

 

[philmud]

Here's how my hocks came up after 6 hours in the smoker.