Smoked Salmon
Jun 19, 2012 Posted by Grant:
I have been wanting to smoke some salmon for a long time, so when I was invited to attend the Myers' family picnic and needed to bring a dish, that's what I decided to do. The Myers family are the children of my father's sister, Lois, and her husband, Charles.
I purchased two fresh fillets of wild Alaskan salmon, weighing about 2 pounds apiece.
Usually the fish is cured before smoking. I decided on a quick cure using maple sugar as the sweetener. Maple sugar is what remains after the sap of the sugar maple tree is boiled for longer than is needed to create maple syrup. It results in a tasty brown powder.
The cure:
2 tablespoons Kosher salt
1 tablespoon Maple sugar powder
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
Place the fish skin side down on a pan and sprinkle the cure over the top of the fish and place in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour. Longer if you like it really salty.
Remove the fish, rinse off all of the cure and pat dry with paper towels.
Then I sprinkled on 1 more Tablespoon of maple sugar for flavor and placed it in the smoker skin side down.
I smoked it at 175-200 degrees for 2 hours using apple wood.
Here's the freshly smoked salmon coming off the smoker.
The fish needs to be cooked to an internal temperature of 150 degrees, so I finished it in a low oven at 200 degrees. Don't cook it too much or you will end up with jerky. You want it to be moist.
Plate it up and enjoy!
The texture and flavor of this wild salmon was outstanding. It's a simple, yet elegant, dish to bring along to any gathering. Pretty portable, too.
Give it a try and let me know how it turns out!
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Reader Comments (4)
IT WAS ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS!
SALMON IS ONE OF OUR FAVORITES. WISH I HADN'T EATEN SO MUCH OTHER FOOD BEFORE I TRIED IT, I WOULDHAVE EATEN MORE!!!
I never knew that Salmon could taste so good. We will have to try it at home and see if we can do it just like yours.
Thanks you guys! Glad you enjoyed the salmon. It's one of my favorites.
Sounds delish. Reminds me of my brother in Alaska. He brines his filets and smokes them. I think you have to pressure cook them instead of a water bath.