I've never used orange chips. I'm looking at the photos of those salmon fillets and imagining the flavors of that orange mixed with butter, lemon zest, brown sugar and that sprinkle of lemon pepper. I'm imagining that they tasted awesome. But then...then you hooked and reeled me in with that salmon shmear on a kosher salted bagel. I grew up on salted bagels with lox and those bagels remain my favorite to this day--they're just very hard to find in my area without pre-ordering them from a supermarket bakery first. YOU'RE hungry????? I'm going to try both your recipes.Ive been using orange chips (from academy) in the MES, and coat the filet with a melted butter/lemon zest/brown sugar mix and sprinkle some lemon pepper on top. I put mine straight onto a non-stick grilling rack I got at kroger with thinner crossed grate/mesh (had to cut the supplied wire handles off with bolt cutters just long enough for them to slide onto the MES rack guides) and smoke at 220 for around 2hrs. Any leftovers get flaked, chopped, and mixed with cream cheese for the best bagel shmear I've had to date on a kosher salt bagel. Ok now I've gone and made myself hungry. Also I've yet to need to soak chips, and have noticed the first load burns quick, then subsequent loads burn nice and slow (I really only have used the AMNPS on longer smokes 4hrs+).
When I was using wood chips in my MES 30 I soaked them a couple of times but found there was no difference between using them wet or dry. Soon after I switched to the AMNPS and wood pellets. Now I only use wood chips to throw on top off charcoal briquettes when I'm grilling in my Weber kettle grill.
