Smoking White Fish

woodcutter · Mar 13, 2015

I was given 5 Whitefish to try in the smoker. I scaled, cut in half and fileted the belly bones out and the skin is still on. I put them in a weak brine and will smoke tomorrow.

1 gal water

1 1/2 cup pickling salt

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 Tbs garlic powder

1 Tbs onion powder

Because of work sleep and everything that fights the smoker the fish will be in the brine about 16 hours.

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woodcutter
Mar 13, 2015

More tomorrow.

tropics · Mar 13, 2015

I'll be watching, working a flea market tomorrow.

woodcutter · Mar 14, 2015

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woodcutter
Mar 14, 2015

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woodcutter
Mar 14, 2015

woodcutter · Mar 14, 2015

The fish turned out too salty and the color was not what I wanted. It is still good enough to eat. I never had white fish before so I don't have anything to compare it to.

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woodcutter
Mar 14, 2015

gary s · Mar 14, 2015

Nice looking Fish

Gary

smokinadam · Mar 14, 2015

Woodcutter said:
The fish turned out too salty and the color was not what I wanted. It is still good enough to eat. I never had white fish before so I don't have anything to compare it to.

DSCN0062.JPG

woodcutter

Mar 14, 2015

nice looking. My brother went on a guided trip for these and was suppose to get me some to smoke but the guide forgot to do his job and put them on fish. I was going to do them while as that's how majority of the markets here sell them. Spring sucker will be in very soon and I'll post some qview from them.

tropics · Mar 15, 2015

Todd look s good to me.

boykjo · Mar 15, 2015

Nice looking fish.... Your brine had too much salt... I would reduce the salt content by half next time and I bet they'll be perfect

Joe

cmayna · Mar 15, 2015

Sorry to hear it turned out too salty, always a concern I have when doing fish. As recommended, I'd cut the salt content in half or more. Whatever you do next time, be sure to take notes.

thepackerbacker · Mar 15, 2015

I am doing some whitefish we caught up on the bay earlier this winter as i type this. I will start a thread soon to show the Q-view and how I went about it. Like you, this is my first time smoking whitefish and have no clue what I am doing.

SMF is invaluable in situations like this. If someone else comes up short and read what happened, that is one less mistake I will end up making. I looked around quite extensively and there really wasn't any "good, do all your whitefish like this" thread out there, here nor there.

Like you, I am smoking fillets.

woodcutter · Mar 18, 2015

thepackerbacker said:
I am doing some whitefish we caught up on the bay earlier this winter as i type this. I will start a thread soon to show the Q-view and how I went about it. Like you, this is my first time smoking whitefish and have no clue what I am doing.

SMF is invaluable in situations like this. If someone else comes up short and read what happened, that is one less mistake I will end up making. I looked around quite extensively and there really wasn't any "good, do all your whitefish like this" thread out there, here nor there.

Like you, I am smoking fillets.

Well I understand about my brine being too salty but I wasn't expecting the color. A friend had told me White fish is oily so I should go for a longer drier smoke. The fish was turning yellow just like butter and I thought it would eventually start turning amber color. I forked it at one point it was starting to flake. That is when I should have pulled it. I didn't find it to be overly oily at all.

crazymoon · Mar 19, 2015

WC, I dry my fillets one hour at room temp and another hour in the smoker at 120 w/out smoke and get color, not sure what happened to your fillets. As everyone said salt was way too much for that long of a brine time.

gary s · Mar 19, 2015

Maybe your next batch will be exactly what you want

Gary

woodcutter · Mar 19, 2015

CrazyMoon said:
WC, I dry my fillets one hour at room temp and another hour in the smoker at 120 w/out smoke and get color, not sure what happened to your fillets. As everyone said salt was way too much for that long of a brine time.

I found out that the yellow color is the nature of the White fish.

cmayna · Mar 19, 2015

Mellow Yellow

thepackerbacker · Mar 20, 2015

Woodcutter said:
I found out that the yellow color is the nature of the White fish.

check out my thread just did these last weekend also.... i think CrazyMoon is on to something with the whitefish. Low and slow so they really dry out well, oil/fat is still there so really good. Honestly best fish iv had smoked. Prefer to Salmon or anything else honestly.

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