A late night knock at the door!

[wade]

Friday 8 pm at home. I am sitting watching TV waiting for Joyce to fetch my slippers and pour me a large Woodford Reserve, whilst she finishes cooking my dinner **. A knock on the door... "Hi Wade, can you smoke a couple of Trout for me that I caught today?". "Sure" I said, "bring them in"...

** Those of you who know Joyce will suspect that this may not be totally accurate :-)

He struggled in with the very large cool box and he said "I am in no hurry for them".

"How many are there?" I asked

"I am not sure" he said. "Maybe 25 or 30" !!!!!

What was expected to be a nice quiet weekend suddenly wasn't.

The following morning they were all gutted and filleted and in the fridge ready for smoking (there were actually 26 fish). I would normally dry brine them but because of the volume of fish I immersion brined these for 5 minutes (150g salt per litre of water) before allowing them to drain for about an hour. They were then smoked at 20 C for 20 hours.

I didn't take any photos of them with heads, fins and tails but here they are after being smoked and about 2/3 of the way through slicing and packaging the batch.



Most of the local fishermen here love to catch the fish but once landed they don't know what to do with them. Some do get returned to the water but many of them get taken home, put in the freezer and forgotten - before being thrown away a couple of years later !! At least when they get them back smoked and ready to eat they don't get wasted.

 

[hardcookin]

At least he should have cleaned them for you.
Woodford Reserve...Good stuff!!

 

[wade]

I usually don't accept them unless they have been gutted when they are caught. These were all caught that afternoon though and had been kept on ice right from the water, so I made an exception.

 

[gmc2003]

That was awfully nice of you. They look great. Did you get to keep any of the fruits of your labor.

Chris

 

[crazymoon]

W, Good looking fish and professional looking packaging!

 

[tropics]

Wade nice job on the smoked fish
Richie

 

[wade]

That was awfully nice of you. They look great. Did you get to keep any of the fruits of your labor.

Enough for dinner tonight :-)

 

[wade]

Thanks guys :-)

 

[SmokinAl]

Your too nice of a guy Wade, I would have kept at least half the catch for cleaning & smoking them!
Al

 

[bdskelly]

Well done Wade. B

 

[phatbac]

That was really nice of you! you are a gentleman Wade!

Happy Smoking (fish),
phatbac (Aaron)

 

[atomicsmoke]

Leave it to Wade to set the bar high for all of us. Both in the smoke fish presentation (pretty sure taste matches the appearance) and being a quality dude.

How does 5 minutes in immersion brining work?

20C? So cold smoked? No further drying?

 

[73saint]

Beautiful looking smoked fish! Makes me want to try smoking some of the fish I catch here (specs, bass, redfish).

 

[wade]

How does 5 minutes in immersion brining work? 20C? So cold smoked? No further drying?

Thanks Atomic :)

This is a common way for traditional smoked haddock to be commercially produced over here. I have just adapted the method for bulk smoked trout production. The fillets are first washed and then they are immersed in the brine. The salt in the brine then acts as a bacterial inhibitor on the surface of the fish which provides protection until the fillets lose sufficient water in the smoker. Although the immersion time is only 5 minutes you do not rinse off the brine (you just let it drain off) and so the salt effectively remains in contact with all of the fish exposed surfaces throughout the smoke.

Yes they were cold smoked. The combination of the 20 C (70 F) and the constant flow of air/smoke through the smoker was ideal for reducing the fish moisture content during the smoke. The couple of fillets I checked had lost 18-19% weight by the end.

 

[atomicsmoke]

Thank you. That will save a lot of time in the future.

This wouldn't work for hot smoked wish would it?

 

[wade]

Yes from a safety perspective it would work fine for hot smoked fish - you can hot smoke the fish without pre brining it at all if you wanted. The brine does firm up the flesh though and the sugar and spices in some brines are there to add sweetness and additional flavours, which may not penetrate sufficiently in such a short period of time.
Personally, I like to be able to taste the fish but many on here seem to like to have it end up sweet and salty - I think it is a cultural difference between continents. I have tried several of the highly praised brines from here (I published a comparison on here a few years ago) and with most of them the fish ended up either way too sweet, too salty, or both.

 

[Geebs]

Very nice of you Wade, wish I was close enough to sample!

 

[atomicsmoke]

I am not concerned with the safety aspect. Rather looking for a short brining step if possible.
I plan hot smoking some lean fish soon - i would give it a try.

I don't use sugar in brines and it seems the amount of salt i use for dry curing works for my palate.

Wasnt sure how a strong/short brine/no rinse would taste in smoked (cooked) lean fish. Cold smoked fish is saltier than cooked fish.

 

[pushok2018]

Wow! Nice looking trout.... Beautiful! Did you really smoked it for 20 hours? Isn't it little too long? The reason I am asking this question because if I cold smoke more thicker salmon or carp for 6 hours it getting over powered with smoke.
Is your smoke very light during the process? Thanks!

 

[kit s]

Just wondering about a few things.
So what did the misses think about the whole thing?
Did your "friend" offer you any?
What the heck is the limit in your neck of the woods? I mean those are decent size fish and well if the limit of fish is that big it just surprises me and so many get to that size.
I usually add some brown sugar to my brine for fish, but still they do look good. Nice packaging too!