HELP.....Hot Smoke Salmon

[ecpederson]

I just purchased a Bradley Digital 4 rack smoker.   My wife is dying for smoked salmon, but she wants it hot like it would be served at the restaurant.   It seems as the recipes posted are more of a cold served smoked salmon.  Any help with recipe for smoking and serving hot salmon?

I want to try the Kummock recipe but fear she will be disappointed.

Help!

[pensrock]

I for one can tell you she won't be disappointed eating Kummoks salmon. But it is not like you say, served hot on the plate, like baked salmon but it is a hot smoked salmon. There are many on here that use salmon much much more than I so hopefully they will chime in with a couple recipes for you to try.

Welcome to the forum.  :)

[KyNola]

EC,
Welcome to the forum.  You absolutely will not go wrong using Kummok's recipe.  It is pretty much the holy grail when it comes to salmon.  Your wife will be very happy.  If she wants it served hot, calculate your cooking time to coincide with dinner but trust me, she will eat this salmon on a rock.

Have fun and let us know how it turns out.

KyNola

[pensrock]

Your post just reminded me of a show I seen the other day, Emeril was making dishes inspired by Army and Navy cooks. One was a hot smoked salmon and it looked great. I do not remember all the details but I'm sure you can find it on the Food Network' site. He took a cedar plank and layed it on a burner to get it smoking very well. Then placed it into a stovetop smoker box and placed the salmon on the unburned side. I'm not sure what else he put into the pan before covering it to allow it to cook. It did look good though.

[westexasmoker]

Can't go wrong with Kummok salmon!  FTW!!!!...After frozen and then thawed, we pull it into the oven and heat it up and OMG  its amazing (and the Boss doesn't even like salmon.....I'm working on that!!  ::) )

C

[FLBentRider]

I did a hot smoked the other day.

We prepared it with spices similar to baking or grilling, and I used 3 pucks of Apple. Took about an hour or so. Rave reviews.

[ecpederson]

OK...I did 3 lb. with a half Kummock recipe and I think I could have used a 1/4 recipe of the Teriyaki brine.  I cut two fillets in thirds and one fillet into what I would call jerky strips...3/8 to 1/2 thick the length of the fishes girth.  I soaked it over night and started the smoker at 12:00 noon...the temperature was impossible to keep at 120 for more then 1 hour and it went straight to 140 which was also hard to hold...then with an 1.5 hours to go I bumped it to 170 and was there until 6:00.  The larger pieces where very good...they came out more moist then I ever imagined.  The smaller pieces I would say are like I described before...jerky.  They are a delicious snack...a little salty for my taste and may be a bit too much smoke.  My wife like it but she wasn't jumping for joy...but she said it was good...I know she thinks it needs a tweaking but what I am not sure.  My 7 year old also ate it but he didn't beg for more...but then again he never does.  Any comments on how to make it less salty?

[West Coast Kansan]

Give us a little more info from the brine time forward and I bet you get some ideas.  One of the things I have learned is the value of serving on a hot plate.  "Careful the disk is hot" kind of thing finally soaked in.  Makes everything seem like hot food and the sides can have thier own small bowl with the appropriate temperture.  Enjoy !

[Habanero Smoker]

Hi ecpederson;

As WCK mentioned, a better description of how you brine will be helpful.

As for the temperatures, when using very low temperatures, using the cold smoke setup is very useful in managing the cabinet temperatures. I don't have time to look for the links, but if you do a search you will find a few threads that describe this.

[ecpederson]

Basically I mixed the brine, 1/2 recipe.  cut the cold fish layed in the brine...the pieces wanted to float...so I took shisscabob sticks and made a wooded grate to wedge against the tupperware bowl sides and stuck the brine and fish mixture in the refrigerator for 12 hours exactly.  I removed the fish from the brine and layed on the smoking racks and then placed back in the refrig. for 3 hours.  The fish went straight from the refrig. to the smoker and I followed the smoking directions exactly...expect for the trouble keeping the temperature under 144.  Thats it!

[aces-n-eights]

Hey ec, welcome to the forum!

A couple of random thoughts...  How much smoke did you apply to this salmon?  A rookie mistake i made (and i'm barely past being a rookie  ;) ) was to apply smoke for the entire cooking time.  I missed the part in the recipe that suggested 1.5 to 2 hrs of smoke.  I also mis-read the brine recipe and used 1 cup of salt and 2 CUPS of brown sugar instead of 2 POUNDS of brown sugar.  So the end product was very salty salmon jerky that was only edible by me!

I've found that like most things you get better with practice and there is a lot of good advice here to guide you along the way.

Happy smoking!