Smoked Sockeye

[CK]

We start off with 2 of the finest from the Fraser river.

All carved up and readdy for the brine.

All I use is 1 cup of coarce salt and 3 cups of brown sugar.

All mixed up with the fish layered for an over night soak, the sugar will turn to a liquid.

After 2 hours sitting on the racks and ready to go in the OBS.

6 hour later we have smoked salmon, they look shiney as I brushed on some maple syrup an hour before I took them out.

The fish turned our really good  8)

[smoker pete]

lordy lordy, that's some fine looking candy!

[Slamdunk]

yum yum yum

Good looking snacks

[DTAggie]

Mighty fine indeed!

[Kummok]

Dang....Some great looking Reds....if that tastes HALF as good as it looks, I think you've achieved nirvana!!

[squirtthecat]

Nice!  Our salmon doesn't look like that here...

It comes on little Styrofoam trays wrapped in plastic.  (and says something about a Chilean Farm in the small print) ;)

[CK]

Hey thanks guys.
Thanks Kummok, I programed my PID to your times 120 for 1.5hours, 140 for 3 hours and 175 for 1.5 hours.
1 hour cherry and 2 hour alder.

Sure beats the Little Chief I used for years on fish.

[KyNola]

Beautiful salmon!  Love that nice shine.

[Quarlow]

Hey nice looking fish for sure. Did you say you brined for 2 hours before you smoked? How dry is the flesh?

[_Bear_]

Looks great. I have some smoked slamon my brother gave me a couple of weeks ago in my lunch today. He goes out to Kitimat 3 or 4 times a year, he has a 32 ft boat down there he uses for fishing. Last trip out his buddies and him cought almost 400 lbs of salmon and several crabs. He gave me 25 lbs of Coho that is in my freezer waiting to be smoked plus about 8 lbs that he smoked on his Bradley. He also gave me about 15 lbs of crab legs that I have been dipping into.

[CK]

Hey nice looking fish for sure. Did you say you brined for 2 hours before you smoked? How dry is the flesh?

It was in the brine for about 15 hours (over night) and then I air dried it for 2 hours.
The amount of fish and the time it was in the smoker was spot on, not dry at all and not "mushy" the meat is firm.

[Quarlow]

OK it just looked like you said you only brined for 2  hrs. Good job.

[jdomep]

brine, is there water or some other kind of liquid added to the salt and sugar?

[Quarlow]

Hi JD, their is no liquid added to the dry brine. But the salt pulls so much moisture out of the fish you end up with basicly a wet brine. As he said just 3 cups of brown sugar and 1 cup of course salt. It is the way my dad has always done it and it is the method I also use. You can add spices to it also, like granulated garlic or pepper or whatever you like.