Smoked Tuna (Lots of tuna) with Qview`

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catzcradle

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Original poster
So, one of the new things I've discovered about the group I took over at work last year is that when my SVP holds a twice a year smoke-out at work, my group is called on to actually do the cooking. We have a big-chief and a MES 30 there.  The problem is that there is never enough capacity so a few months back, I was drafted for Brisket for the "beef and pork" smokeout.  I think I shared some pix back then, but anyways, this is now.  Turns out a bunch of the guys in my team go tuna fishing every Sept.  All in all I think they brought home a couple hundred pounds of cleaned tuna.  Well, so that means the second smokeout is for that tuna.  Once again I volunteered since I have my new cookshack, and I poured over the web to find something I'd like to use as directions.

Lets say, I've never had fish I liked as much as this stuff that came out of the smokers today.

This is everything brined and forming the pellicle

c141b9bf_brined-tuna.jpg


Had to call in the MES30 for backup as the new Cookshack while larger wasn't enough

88766629_smokers-running.jpg


And finally, the finished fish

f91d6f82_cooked2.jpg


201a49f9_cooked-1.jpg


Now, I can't remember where I found this recipie, but it is devine.

I did a test batch the day before, and made some adjustments, so this is what I used, and the tuna came out perfect, and not dry.

per 10 lbs tuna cut into 1.5" thick chunks across the grain.

2C water

2C apple Juice

1C Brown Sugar

1/2 C honey

1/2 C Soy Sauce

1/2 C Kosher Salt *

1/8 C Molasses

1/8 C Thai or Chinese chili sauce (the one I found was Hunan style)

3 bay leaves

* means changes from the original

Now I found the original directions too salty for me, so I cut down the salt from the oringal 3/4 C.  I also heated the brine up to help dissolve everything.  The salt didn't dissolve in cold water.  Bring the brine back down if it heats up to room temp, then add tuna, and put in fridge for about 3 hours.  6 was the original, and way to salty, and lost the tuna flavor.  3 seems to have given me what I wanted.

Orinally it said to rinse and pat dry, I just patted dry to keep the chili flakes and such on the fish.  Then air dry for an hour or two in front of a fan or in fridge.   Here the fan method seemed to go past a nice pellicle and too fast into a dry surface, so watch closely or do in fridge.

After the pellicle forms, dredge in more brown sugar, place on racks, and smoke at 175 for anwhere from 60-120 minutes.  The original recipe said 90-120, but i found mine on a small batch finished in just under an hour, where as a full smoker took longer to get to temp, and took about 90 minutes.   If you have larger pieces, maybe longer.  One inch thick got too dry I found, 1.5 inch seemed good, but you can go larger I'm sure.
 
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Reactions: dannyubc
Love me some smoked tuna!!!  Great looking batch there!  Congrats on the success, and thanks for posting the recipe!
 
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