I am going to smoke some salmon this weekend but may not be able to babysit it all day and step the temp up in stages.What is the best temperature to set the smoker and leave it? I will be using a RANCO controller so I can be fairly precise.
THANKS! :)
If it was me I would use 150, same as I do my jerky at, plan for about 8 hours total time if you with 150.
If you start the smoking process at 150 degrees, you're likely to get white "boogers" of fat forming on top of the fillets. But don't worry about them. It's only a cosmetic issue. If you wipe them off an hour or so before you finish smoking, you may not be able to tell they were ever there.
The way to avoid "boogers" is by starting the smoking process at a fairly low temperature, perhaps 120 degrees, and stepping the temperature up every hour or so until you reach your final temperature.
Thanks guys!
Is there an IT temp you should take salmon to? I did some last weekend and tried to get the IT to 145 and it seemed to take forever. Fish came out a little dry after 7 hours in the smoker. I started at 130 for 1 hour then 140 for 1 hour,150 for 2 hours,160 for 2 hours then 170 until it hit 145. I did 3 hours of smoke using alder.
For salmon I will start at 130°F and start checking the fish, but I will rarely go over 140°F. Many don't go by IT but will take the fish out when it flakes with a twist of a fork.