INGREDIENTS

INSTRUCTIONS

There are several methods that fall into two overall categories: Hot
smoked [cooked] methods include barbecued, kippered, smoked-canned  and
small whole fish and Cold Smoked [below 85 deg F] include Scotch/
Irish/Norwegian/Nova Scotian style, Lox, Indian or hard smoked,
pickled-smoked, Seelachs and smoked roes & livers.  Cold smoked
products are still raw, deeply colored, with a texture  like cured ham
and can be thinly sliced without crumbling. Hot smoked  products are
colored on the outside only and will flake like other  styles of cooked
fish.  Barbecued: or smoke-cooked fish is made in a pre-heated covered
barbecue or a box-and-hotplate smoker. The fish is cooked in a smoky
atmosphere without preliminary cold smoking or prior conditioning.
Kippered: fish are conditioned before hot smoking by first drying the
fish in barely warm air, then bringing it up to cooking temperature
gradually to improve its appearance and quality.  Canning: fish is
first lightly smoked by putting it into a pre- heated  smoker. High
temperatures are used to draw the oil out to the  surface. The smoking
is light as the flavor will intensify during the  pressure cooking
stage. The fish should also be further dried before  canning.  Cold
smoked: is known variously as Scotch, Irish, Norwegian or nova  Scotian
smoked and is appreciated by gourmets more than any other  method. The
fish are salted before smoking and is still raw although  it is cured
when finished.  Lox: or Lachs [German] can mean many things-
traditionally fresh fish  lightly salted and mildly smoke cured
[therefore still needing  refrigeration and is perishable], recently
frozen fish thawed,  salt-sugar cured and lightly smoked [Nova Lax] and
even salt-sugar  cured and unsmoked.  Hard smoked: jerky like and so
dehydrated that it does not need  refrigeration; based on traditional
Native Indian preparations of  cutting fillets into thin strips. These
strips are partially dried by  wind on sunny days or by fan in a
dehydrator or a force draft smoker  and smoked for only a portion of
the drying time.  Pickle-smoked: fish are pickled before smoking. This
is a good way to  enhance the taste of lean fish that do not otherwise
smoke well.  Seelachs: or ersatz salmon are salted, sliced thin, then
dyed and  smoked white fish.  The Smoking Process: When fish is smoked
it is also dried which  improves the keeping qualities and improves the
texture. Hot smoking  also cooks the fish. The steps are filleting,
cutting, salting,  curing, smoking and final preservation.  Filleting
exposes more flesh to salt and smoke and allows faster  drying. Whole
fish unless small take a long unpredictable time to do.  Small whole
fish benefit from having the skin slit to allow  penetration. Large
sides of fish salt and smoke easier if the fillet  is chunked into
pieces according to thickness. Individual pieces can  then be salted,
smoked and dried for varying times according to the  thickness of each
piece. Thick pieces can be used for lox and Scotch  smoked that are
later thinly sliced crosswise for presentation  and  thin pieces hot or
hard smoked, kippered, canned for serving whole.  Salt: is necessary
for flavor, releasing moisture from the fish  thereby drying ut and for
modifying [firming up] the flesh so that it  can be thin sliced when
serving.  N.B. Use only PURE pickling salt  not rock salt of unknown
purity or table salt that contains additives.  Curing: is the process
of draining off the brine and partially drying  the fish. The flavor
develops fully during this waiting time [ of up  to 24 hours] before
actually smoking.  Smoking: is generally done today in forced draft
units to get a  uniform amount of smoke onto all the fish. Natural
draft smokers are  unpredictable, variable and have no natural updraft
in hot weather  unless the smoker is set over 85 deg which results in
poor quality  and cooked fish.  Final preservation is important because
smoked fish, except for hard  smoked, is still perishable. We salt and
smoke lightly for [mild]  flavor and not for preservation. Therefore
refrigerate [up to three  weeks max], freeze or can promptly.
Extracted from: Smoking Salmon & Trout by Jack Whelan. Published by:
Airie Publishing, Deep Bay, B.C. ISBN: 0-919807-00-3 Posted by: Jim
Weller  Posted to MM-Recipes Digest  by "Rfm" <Robert-Miles@usa.net> on
Sep  08, 98

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