First attempt at smoking fish

I decided to try and smoke a smaller Rainbow I caught from a lake close to Bancroft.
I made a brine with water, salt, and brown sugar. Let it sit in the fridge over night.
I used my Weber charcoal grill. A small amount of sugar maple charcoal on one side of the grill with soaked cherry/apple wood chips. Placed the fish on the opposite side of the grill (skin side down) for about 2 hrs.

It tasted great! I'm now on a mission to smoke everything!
I assume Brook Trout or Splake would be good too?
Would Lake Trout or Walleye be a good fish to smoke?
Anyone have any other quick tips?

Any difference in flavor between a wet brine and a dry?

Too bad Salmon don't run in Bancroft. (always the fish market)

Fatty or Oily Fish are much better in the smoker - Trout, Salmon, Whitefish. Pickeral and Pike are not as good because of their lack of fat, dries them out "Too-Much" in the smoker.

MC

Hey bud just saw this! I too tried smoking fish for the first time this February, and here are the results/steps... you can definetely smoke brook trout, lakers, rainbows, splake, whitefish, herring, and like MC said all fatty fish. I have also heard of smoking pike and walleye up north, but it is less common... IMO beer batter is the only way to go on the lean white fleshed fish like walleye.

the fish, some specs

http://i207.photobucket.com/albums/b...IMG_2055-1.jpg

the brining, i am no expert, but as far as I know most use an wet brine.

http://i207.photobucket.com/albums/b...1/IMG_2083.jpg

drying (fan dried)

http://i207.photobucket.com/albums/b...1/IMG_2089.jpg

the final result, maple-scotch whiskey glazed smoked brook trout

http://i207.photobucket.com/albums/b...1/IMG_2113.jpg

for my first time the results where pretty good, but i under smoked them because like you i used a charcoal grill, but it was a small one(the size of the webber mini) and i couldnt get enough smoke without it getting too hot, ideally you want to keep the temps bellow 180-200 degrees C or the fish releases its fat and you get white spots... my buddy has a nice smoker, but i didnt want to give up half my fish, only had around 4lbs so my cheapness cost me this time... lol but a good learning experience! got everything right but the smoke.

heres a link to indian candy, amazing stuff, went out to simcoe for lakers the near the closer but because the ice was breaking coulndt get any lakers to make candy, next year or this spring! btw you dont need all the maple syrup he uses, that would be pretty pricey, you can use brown sugar instead.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhef6s7uyk8

Man that looks sooooo good , Im a huge fan of smoked lakers or anny trout for that mater ,but befor they shut down the sturgeon catch up here I tried it smoked and it is fantastic.. I realy need to learn this art.. A friend of ours had a huge smoker made from a piece of culvert, with racks in it and worked great ..

A Ray

I would hate to take a beautiful speck and toss it into a smokey dungeon lol. Goes down much better on the BBQ lol.

I love smoked pike. I've never tried smoked lakers so i cant compare, but smoked pike is great. You have to watch to make sure you dont dry it out, but i've done it a few times and never had a problem.

Years ago I knew a guy who used corn cobs to smoke fish. It was great, but he had his own secret recipe for brine too.

I have been smoking Fish for a while know and by Far Rainbows(steelheads) and Salmon are bar none the best then comes lakers and whitefish..but the best way it make a brine of white sugar/brown sugar salt add some seasonings like montreal steak spice and soak that in the fridge over night...Then make a mixture of brown sugar and maple syrup(aunt Jamima syrup will work just as good for far less of a cost)...mix like a thick mud and put on filet let sit on rack for a couple hours then douce the tops of filets with brown sugar and smoke time and heat are for your preference as some like it a little more dry and some like it moist cooking times will vary on size of filet too.I use a Bradley smoker and use a variety of smoke pucks one hickory next will be apple,cherry and etc etc and with what flavors I have...I usually heat too around 180 degrees for around 4 hrs and this is my variation of Indian Candy.... I have friends that bring me fish to smoke regularly where my fee is I get half...and in the end everyone has always been happy...Try this it wont dissapoint... <')))><

Smoking any meat is an art,Grew up on a farm we're we did all butchering/smoking.Now one thing that I'll tell you guys,smoked beef vs smoked pork no difference in taste.Smoked Salmon vs smoked Trout no difference..the difference is the texture of the meat,i could fool any one of you's between trout or sucker:thumbup:

I was using wet brine for five years until last year, but I have been reading quiet a bit about it and now switched to dry brine. 50%salt/50%sugar plus some herbs and I like it a lot. It doesn't take as much space in the fridge, I can taste the herb a lot more and it dry out the fish a lot more too. I'm not sure how much you read about brine but the salt is supposed to remove the moisture from the fish and add the herbs flavor to it. So soaking the fillet in wet brine doesn't make much sense to me anymore (even so I was used to do it and to enjoy it). Also I tried something different last time, I smoked a 10lbs lake trout for only an hour and a half at 180deg with lots of smoke. I got something like the smoked salmon you get at restaurant, kind of cold smoked.
I thing sure about smoking fish it's that there are a lot of things to try and don't forget to keep track of you do because I found it difficult to do the exact same thing twice (like the brine, amount of smoke, and so on...).
Have fun smoking !!!

The quick and easy method that IVe found is cover the whole piece or pieces of fish in brown sugar and let it sit for about an hour. This will pull out a large portion of moisture from the fish. Then wash the fish just enough to get the now liquid sugar off and pat dry with paper towl. Have half of your BBQ on medium and put the fish on the other half. Then with what ever smoke chips you like put them in a smoke tin or wrap a bunch up with tinfoil, poke a hole in the top and put in on the side on the BBQ thats turned on. Even a big piece of salmon will only take 20- 30 min.

I like doing it this was and the tradisional by but this was is much faster and my wife likes the the fish alot more this way and it doent loose all of its moisture but tastes almost identical.

Smoked some Rainbow on Tuesday for about 6 hours at 200 degrees. came out really good but now my question is how do you store it and how long will it last?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Abitibi Ray

Man that looks sooooo good , Im a huge fan of smoked lakers or anny trout for that mater ,but befor they shut down the sturgeon catch up here I tried it smoked and it is fantastic.. I realy need to learn this art.. A friend of ours had a huge smoker made from a piece of culvert, with racks in it and worked great ..

A Ray

---

I too had tried smoked sturgeon and it's awsome. It has a different texture, almost like chicken, but I won't e getting anymore - too bad!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LadyinRed

Years ago I knew a guy who used corn cobs to smoke fish. It was great, but he had his own secret recipe for brine too.

---

Did he use the corn to make whiskey? :D I've never heard of using corn cobs - how did it taste?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Wired

Smoked some Rainbow on Tuesday for about 6 hours at 200 degrees. came out really good but now my question is how do you store it and how long will it last?

---

When smoking you need a temperature of 165 F to kill any bacteria or micro organisms (including trichinosis). I try not to go too far above that. If you're smoking filliets, I usually cold smoke for an hour and hot smoke for 2 hours and that's enough. you don't want to over smoke it or dry it out.

Storage - I use a rub with a cure in it which helps to kill bacteria. Then I vacuum pack it and stick in the fridge. It will keep for several months easy. Freezing can change the texture of the meat. Fatty fish are the best and fish such as pickerel and pike can turn into "fish jerky" if you're not careful.

Be careful of you're damper setting, too far open and all of the moisture escapes, too far closed and you get a heavy smudge.

Roe+

Smoked salmon is soo good

As far as a good wood to use for smoking, I go out to my apple tree and take a smaller green limb that needs trimmed out. cut into puck sized pieces. saves buying it. Good info and recipes. old 243

Has anyone found anything to replace the pucks used in the Bradley smokers? They work well but I find them expensive! I have a big homemade smoker that I use a mix of dry maple and green apple wood for the first few hours of smoking fish and then the last couple of hours I use corncobs to finish them off.

I now just use maple chips or really any hardwood aslong as it is dry . Then get a can of apple juice or ,cherry juice or even strawberry etc . Soak your chips in that .

TD

Try putting the fillets in a ziplock in the fridge with enough maple syrup to coat them. 2 - 3 hours is usually enough then hot smoke or grill.

How long will smoked fish keep if it is frozen?

From what I've read it makes absolutely no difference what wood you use in the smoking process. We've used maple, apple, cherry and ash and we couldn't tell the difference. All the flavor comes mostly from the brine and brown sugars.

Thanks Sawbill

Attachment 25485Attachment 25486So I decided to try my luck at smoking some rainbow a friend of mine dropped off to me. I started with frozen fillets and then did a dry brine in course sea salt and brown sugar. I glazed the fish with maple syrup and then applied the dry brine. I let it sit for 12 hours and then rinsed the fillets to prepare for drying. I smoked at about 200f with mesquite in the bbq for almost 2 hours then finished it off in the oven for another 20min. It turned out really good but IMO it was a little to salty.

My question is for you smoking enthusiast. Does a dry brine or wet brine retain more salt in the fish. I would be willing to sacrifice the shelf life of the fish in order to not have a sodium induced heart attack. Also I could only get my hands on the mesquite at the time when shopping, does the wood make a difference in the salt retention in the fish?

Thanks for any help to this. Can't wait to try a second time.

I had salty fish the first time I tried smoking. You need to rinse the fish off after brining and allow it to dry before smoking it. The rinsing off gets rid of the real saltiness.

There are some interesting articles on smoking fish on SalmonUniversity:

http://salmonuniversity.com/rs_htss01_index.html

The first one covers dry brining.

Some good articles about fishing the Great Lakes too, if you like that kind of stuff :)