Smoked salmon (something new)

[bryce]

So I'm trying two new things today. 1st - I've never smoked salmon on my new WMS so this is a total WAG (wild ass guess) for me. 2nd - this was a spontaneous decision so no time brine. I've never not brined smoked salmon so this will be interesting. I added a fish rub and a little brown sugar to the top of each piece and that's about it.

Smoking at 150 (if any of you have WSM smoked salmon experience is this a good temp?)

Wild caught Sockeye for the fish

Using a combination of Apple and Hickory

Figuring this will take 4 hours...

I was really good at hot-smoking salmon on my old, cheap grill so I'm hoping to lean how to do it on this one.

Here it is with the rub. I used a towel to try to soak up moisture since I didn't have time to form a pellicle.  I'm cutting all sorts of corners with this one..hahaha

fish 1.jpg

• bryce
• Apr 7, 2015

The seasoning

fish 2.jpg

• bryce
• Apr 7, 2015

Into the smoker they go

fish 3.jpg

• bryce
• Apr 7, 2015

fish 4.jpg

• bryce
• Apr 7, 2015

I'll take some more pictures later.

 

[bryce]

1 hour in.

fish 5.jpg

• bryce
• Apr 7, 2015

 

[bkleinsmid]

Crazy enough......I think you got a handle on this one. They look great.....

Brad

 

[dirtsailor2003]

Looks tasty!

 

[brooksy]

Looking forward to seeing the final product!

 

[bryce]

Thanks everyone - so far so good. 1 hour in now. The proof will be in the taste but I can't imagine this coming close to a nicely brined smoked salmon.

fish 6.jpg

• bryce
• Apr 7, 2015

 

[bryce]

3 hours in and removed the fish. Ran the temp a little too high for this smoker as I would have liked another hour at a lower temp.

Anyhow, there's definitely no substitute for a good brine. The salmon was average without it. A bit too bland and I won't use that rub for smoking again.

So, I'm going to mess around and try to candy up some of the fillets with brown sugar back in the smoker. We'll see!!

fish 7.jpg

• bryce
• Apr 7, 2015

 

[crazymoon]

B, It still looks good  as is !

 

[bryce]

Thanks CrazyMoon. It was ok. We're eating the rest tonight. Smoked salmon is always better the next day. I think I'll nail it on my next try though.

 

[gary s]

Color looks good, sorry the flavor wasn't what you wanted.

Gary

 

[bryce]

Hi Gary, yeah I took a stab at it knowing most likely it wouldn't be the same. We were really pressed for time but still ended up being fun to experiment. That was $38.00 of wild salmon though!

 

[disco]

Nice looking project but I agree a brine makes salmon great!

Disco

 

[bryce]

True that!

it's really amazing at how brining and smoking salmon transforms it into little pieces of heaven. Other than smoked or cedar planked, I really don't like salmon but boy or boy, I like smoked salmon as much as any pork or beef.