Smoked salmon... the adventure continues

[pax238]

I took my #1 for its maiden voyage yesterday.

I had checked the weather forecast on Saturday and thought I saw that they were predicting low to mid 40’s for Monday. Did my seasoning smoke on Sunday and prepared the salmon with a 4:1 mix of sugar:salt overnight for 9 hours in the refrigerator. Rinsed it, patted it dry and put it back into the refrigerator for 5 hours to form the pellicle. So far so good.

Then I looked at the outdoor thermometer and saw it was 21 degrees, checked the forecast and it was calling for mid to high 20’s. With 2 pounds of Atlantic salmon ready, I decided to go for it.

I used 2.5 oz of alder and set my #1 for 185 degrees. The outside temperature was 26 degrees when I started. Since this was my first smoke (in any smoker), I checked every 15 minutes and saw the internal temperature of the salmon climbing for the first 60 minutes. Then watched it stall at 120 degrees for a half hour. “Wait… there’s no way salmon has enough mass to stall,” thinks this total smoking newbie, with just a little bit of panic running through my head. I raised the temperature setting up to 190 and the internal temperature started to rise again very slowly, while the outside temperature started to drop slowly until it hit 20 degrees.

After 3-1/2 hours, I pulled the salmon at 140 degrees and tented it. The surface was much darker than I had anticipated (no kidding… did I mention it was in the smoker for 3-1/2 hours?). It smelled absolutely fabulous. After a half hour, I sampled a little piece and it tasted even better. Served it up for dinner, and my wife and son loved it.

All in all, a pretty satisfying first effort and a lesson learned - check the forecast more frequently in the days before I’m planning when to smoke, and adjust the temperature of the smoker to compensate for low outside temperatures.

It could have been worse… today it was 12 degrees when I got up. 

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[NDKoze]

Looks really good.

But outside of rain/snow, the outside temperature should not effect your smokes very much at all. I have smoked with my #3 in -20F and not had a problem at all maintaining 235 degrees for a pork butt smoke and smoked a turkey the other day at 15F and had no problems maintaining 250.

Were you monitoring the box tem with a thermometer? If you were my guess is that the smoker temp didn't really change because of the weather. I would have just let it go without ramping the temp unless you were pushing to eat at a certain time. 30 minutes isn't much of a stall and you have to be careful with cooking salmon at too high of a temp.

My two cents anyhow for what it is worth.

It sounds like it was a success, so ya gotta love that.

[pax238]

Thanks Gregg. The only temperature monitoring I did was internal temperature in the thickest part of the salmon.

The reading that I did on smoking salmon here and in other places on the web led me to believe that I would be looking at a smoke time closer to 1-1/2 hours to hit 145 internal temperature, so I thought 3-1/2 hours might be a little strange and attributed the extra time to the outside temperature.

You're right... the end result was really good, so you gotta love that.

[SuperDave]

Barry, the color is all due to your high sugar ratio.

[pax238]

Barry, the color is all due to your high sugar ratio.

Thanks Dave. I was under the impression that 4:1 was the ratio that most people use. Could it be a combination of that sugar:salt ratio and being exposed to smoke for 3-1/2 hours?

[SconnieQ]

I use the same 4:1 ratio of brown sugar to salt. I do everything exactly the same way you did, except...I smoke at 170, I pull the salmon out at 135 and loosely tent with foil. I use cherry or maple (don't really care for the taste alder personally, even though it is super popular for salmon). Don't worry about that little mini-stall. That doesn't sound weird to me at all. Your temps will rise really quickly in the beginning, and slow down as it gets closer to your target temp.

As far as the temperature outside, these are so well insulated, I haven't found that it makes a bit of difference to your temperature setting. It will get there and maintain it just fine, no matter how cold it is. Smoking in the winter is one of my favorite things about this smoker! I live in Wisconsin. And I think winter is the best time to do lower temp smoking like hot-smoked salmon, and cold smoking like cold-smoked salmon lox, because the starting point temp of the box is so cold. I smoke all of my lox in the winter.

As far as how dark, I don't think it's the sugar ratio, because that's what I use, and mine doesn't get that dark. A few theories: Alder: I don't have any experience with alder, but maybe it produces a darker color on the surface? (don't know, others can help with that). Smoke duration: I don't think any of my salmon smokes have gone as long as 3-1/2 hours. More like 1.5 to 2.5 hour range. Is your probe accurate? Maybe put it in some boiling water, and see if it registers 212. If your probe is off, your salmon could have smoked longer than it needed to. Combustion: if your wood was too dry, it might have ignited and produced a lot of black smoke, darkening the surface of the fish. Either way, I think your color issue had something to do with the smoke, but it really doesn't look that dark to me, and I'll bet it was still delicious! I'm wondering about that black spot in the middle though. I'm wondering if moisture built up on the top of your smoker, and dripped? Sometimes I get little black droplets on my salmon. I just dab them with a paper towel when I remove from the smoker.

[pax238]

I use the same 4:1 ratio of brown sugar to salt. I do everything exactly the same way you did, except...I smoke at 170, I pull the salmon out at 135 and loosely tent with foil. I use cherry or maple (don't really care for the taste alder personally, even though it is super popular for salmon). Don't worry about that little mini-stall. That doesn't sound weird to me at all. Your temps will rise really quickly in the beginning, and slow down as it gets closer to your target temp.

Thanks for the reassurance on this, Kari.

As far as the temperature outside, these are so well insulated, I haven't found that it makes a bit of difference to your temperature setting. It will get there and maintain it just fine, no matter how cold it is. Smoking in the winter is one of my favorite things about this smoker! I live in Wisconsin. And I think winter is the best time to do lower temp smoking like hot-smoked salmon, and cold smoking like cold-smoked salmon lox, because the starting point temp of the box is so cold. I smoke all of my lox in the winter.

I plan on trying out some lox once I get the hang of hot smoking. Good to know that winter is a good time to do it.

As far as how dark, I don't think it's the sugar ratio, because that's what I use, and mine doesn't get that dark. A few theories: Alder: I don't have any experience with alder, but maybe it produces a darker color on the surface? (don't know, others can help with that). Smoke duration: I don't think any of my salmon smokes have gone as long as 3-1/2 hours. More like 1.5 to 2.5 hour range. Is your probe accurate? Maybe put it in some boiling water, and see if it registers 212. If your probe is off, your salmon could have smoked longer than it needed to. Combustion: if your wood was too dry, it might have ignited and produced a lot of black smoke, darkening the surface of the fish. Either way, I think your color issue had something to do with the smoke, but it really doesn't look that dark to me, and I'll bet it was still delicious! I'm wondering about that black spot in the middle though. I'm wondering if moisture built up on the top of your smoker, and dripped? Sometimes I get little black droplets on my salmon. I just dab them with a paper towel when I remove from the smoker.

I just bought a mixed box from Fruitawood (alder, apple and maple), so I hope the moisture content is OK. I calibrated my thermometer out of the box before using it and retested it today, so I think I can eliminate that variable.

We finished this salmon today (it was absolutely delicious and moist), and I'll be smoking again in 2 more days. I'm planning to try each of the woods out in an initial smoke to see what the differences are in flavor for salmon. Next up is maple, and I'll be interested in what happens with how dark the surface gets.

Oh yeah, as far as that black spot goes, I ate it for lunch today! No ill effects... yet.

[SconnieQ]

Barry, sounds like you ruled out all of my theories, so the best part is you get to keep experimenting with different variables, and enjoy eating all that salmon! I doubt if it will ever turn out bad. Just different.

[pax238]

Barry, sounds like you ruled out all of my theories, so the best part is you get to keep experimenting with different variables, and enjoy eating all that salmon! I doubt if it will ever turn out bad. Just different.

Not all of them, Kari. Maybe alder is the issue. BTW, experimenting comes naturally to me (I come from the "If it ain't broke, break it" school).

[SconnieQ]

BTW, experimenting comes naturally to me (I come from the "If it ain't broke, break it" school).

Great. Always up for learning and new ideas. Sometimes when something works, we tend not to experiment further with other variables like we should, so glad you are up for it!

[pax238]

Rather than starting a new thread, I figured that I would change the title and update this one with my future attempts.

I did my 2nd smoke a couple of days ago, but waited to post the results until I got a reaction from a friend who has been smoking salmon using a kettle charcoal grill (he pulls some pretty impressive results out of it).

Same prep as the first attempt. 9 hours in the refrigerator with a 4:1 sugar:salt mix, followed by a good rise and then back into the refrigerator for 5 hours.

What changed on this smoke was that I did a little less than 2-3/4 lbs, but cut into 3 pieces. I used a little over 2-1/2 oz of maple this time. And (even though this isn't supposed to make a difference), the outside temperature was in the mid-40's instead of the mid-20's.

Set the smoker for 185 degrees, set my timer for 75 minutes and went back inside to work, fully expecting to come back out and see the internal temperature at around 120 degrees (like the first smoke). When I came back out, it was 128 degrees. No stall this time, and I pulled it at the 1 hour and 40 minute at 139 degrees. It smelled fabulous. Brought it in and tented it loosely for 45 minutes, salivating the whole time.

The result was a far more delicate, lighter colored (even though it doesn't really look like it in the photo), sweeter tasting fish than with the alder, which I expected since it was exposed to smoke for almost 2 hours less. I brought some over to party with my smoking friend, who took one bite, looked at me and said, "I've been smoked." 

BTW, the light area in the top piece in the photo comes from me pulling the shelf out a little too aggressively to get at the probe (it pulled out, along with some of the surface of the salmon).

Tell me again why I waited so long to buy this wonderful smoker?!?!?

[NDKoze]

Looks great!

[kz0m]

Ya Berry, I'm with you with the maple for smoking!  Finished a pork shoulder last night with maple and rubbed with a maple rub from the store.  The smoke smell was amazing!  I'll be doing some salmon followed by cheese and then pork belly.  I'll use maple rub and maple chunk for the pork belly, I can smell the bacon smoke already ;-)

[pax238]

Thanks Gregg.

Carl... I decided to go "natural" for my first cycle of smokes to see what alder, maple and apple taste like without anything added. I plan to try a light glaze of maple syrup the next time through.

[kz0m]

Barry your salmon looked so good, I had to get my hands on some salmon today and try my hand at it as well, first salmon smoke for me today! ;>)  Good way to do a quick smoke with the model 3D.
My wife found some good salmon at $4.99/lb so she picked up about 6 pounds worth.
My dry brine was 1 cup kosher salt, 4 cups brown sugar and 1 table spoon ground pepper.  This salmon still had the skin on it but that's ok, I cut each filet into 4 pieces.  I brined for 3 hours, removed and rinsed well, patted dry and air dried with a fan blowing on them for 1 hour, nice and tacky and shiny.
I placed on a frog matte and into the smoker they went.  I used about 1/2 cup alder chips, 1/4 cup cherry chips and added about 1 oz of maple an hour later, smoked at 170 from start to finish.  After 2.5 hours, I pulled the salmon which was anywhere from 136-140, rested about 30 minutes and then glazed with orange marmalade, makes it yummy good.
I let my wife have the first taste, awesome taste, melt in your mouth and could really taste the smoke flavor!  I'll be vacuum sealing most of this but as you can see in the last picture, we couldn't wait to taste it ;>)  This smoker is a joy to use!

Carl