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Title: Cold-Smoked Salmon
Categories: Fish Smoke Salmon
Yield: 4 Servings
| Salmon |
The weather here on the S.F. Peninsula has been perfect for cold = smoking (mid 60's), so I did up a batch of cold-smoked salmon (a.k.a. lox) with some Yukon River King Salmon. The local silvers are good for grilling, but for cold smoking, the higher the fat content, the better. Yukon River salmon are even better than Copper River, but both can be hard to find around here. Wild North Atlantic varieties are usually better for cold-smoking, but all I can get around here are farm-raised.
The latest batch was the best yet. We had some today with homemade bagels (see Cook's Illustrated - Sept/Oct 97), cream cheese, and razor thin slices of Bermuda onion. It was almost red, white, and blue - as American as apple strudel.
I've got an external smoke generator attached to my electric pit. When cold smoking, the electric pit is turned off and it serves only as an insulated chamber to hold the fish/meat. When "warm smoking" (e.g. smoking sausage in the 130-165 range), the heat is supplied by the electric pit. For both cold and warm smoking, I've tried using my wood-burning BYC with the door partially open, but that requires a lot of attention to maintain the temperature. The external smoke generator is a no-brainer. It is nothing more than a metal container in which sawdust is ignited. A fan blows the smoke into the electric pit. I bought this one from the Sausage Maker, but you could easily construct your own. The electric fan may not be needed if you have adequate draft between the smoke source and the meat. It's important to dampen the sawdust so that it burns slowly.=20
All you have to do is cure the salmon and apply smoke for about 8 hours keeping the salmon as cool as possible. For the cure I use a dry brine of =BD cup kosher salt, =BD cup brown sugar, a little white pepper and Prague powder #1 (nitrite) and let it sit in the fridge under a weight for about 36 hours. Wash the cure off and let dry until tacky before smoking. Got this from Rytec Kutas' book.