Getting ready for the brine

A few years ago Celeste and I visited the wonderful city of Vancouver, Canada.  During out stay we stopped by Granville Island and came across a smokehouse selling Salmon Candy, I’m don’t remember what they called it, but it reminded me a Pig Candy, so I called it Salmon Candy.  A few days ago I was in the store and for some reason when I saw the salmon I thought of that trip and decided it was time to recreate that wonderful taste.

I checked out the internet for recipes and there appears to be just one recipe for for Salmon Candy.  And if there’s only one recipe out there on the world wide web then it must be what I’m looking for.  Well, it wasn’t as good as the Granville Island Salmon Candy so I’ll have to keep trying.

The final product was a little too salty and didn’t have the sweetness that I was hoping for.  The saltiness I think I can get rid of by rinsing and soaking a little longer after the brine.  Or maybe a shorter brine.  Instead of 24 hours maybe cut it down to 12 hours.  As for the sweetness.  It just didn’t come out.  I even put a layer of brown sugar on at the end just to try and get some more sweetness.  Just didn’t work.

Any suggestions?

Salmon Candy

Ingredients:

• 1/2 gallon water
• 1 cup pickling salt
• 2 cups dark dark brown sugar
• 1 cup real maple syrup
• salmon, cleaned
• 3/4 cup honey
• 1/4 cup water

Directions:

Put half the water in in a bowl in the freezer.  Add remaining water to a pan on the stove and heat slightly.  You want the water warm, not hot.  When the water is warm add the salt, sugar and syrup and stir to dissolve.  Let it sit for a couple minutes to make sure all the solids are dissolved.  Then add the water from the freezer.  This should get your water back to almost room temperature.  If the water is still warm to the touch at all let it cool.

Put your salmon in a large bowl or dish and cover with your brine liquid.  Let the salmon brine for 24 hours.  Remove from brine and rinse completely.  You want to get as much salt off the fish as possible.

Cold smoke until done.  Not like jerky, but firm and flaky.  I used apple wood.  The last half the smoke baste with the honey mixed with water.  This will give you the candy texture.

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I filled the Pro-Q Cold Smoke Generator with some hickory wood dust and placed it inside the "Little Chief." The Pro-Q sits perfectly inside the smoker on the stand for the normal wood chip holder.

There's a door on the side of the "Little Chief" that provides easy access to the "tea candle" used to the light the Pro-Q. I did have to tape over the hole in the door because the wind keep blowing out the candle. (The candle is removed as soon as the wood dust starts to smolder and smoke.

Two slabs each of Pepper Jack and Jack cheese along with a slab of Habanero Jack and some Gouda on the racks ready to be placed in the smoker.

I got time recommendations of 2 and 3 hours so I choose 2 1/2 hours. The smoke seemed a little strong when it first came out of the smoker. But since I also got recommendations to wrap the cheese in plastic wrap and let it sit for a little while I'm thinking the smoke taste will mellow a little.

NOTE:  After further discussions with cheese smoking experts I’ve got the cheese wrapped in plastic and in the refrigerator.  A few people have suggested giving it 2 to 3 weeks of aging for the smoke flavor to mellow.  Stay tuned…

Aaron Ralston published an “ezine article” with a good explanation for cold smoking:

Cold smoking is very similar to hot smoking, except the cooking temperature is much lower. The targeted cold smoking temperature range is between 80 degrees F  and 100 degrees F, and the smoking time can range anywhere from 4 hours to 4  days. This process relies on smoke to cure the meat or food being smoked instead of using heat. Some people believe that cold smoking occurs at temperatures between 160-190 degrees F, but smoking at this temperature is really a form of hot smoking.

Types of Smoked Foods

A few examples of foods that are usually cold-smoked include bacon, sausage, ham, cheese, and fish. When smoking fish, a preservation salt is needed to pickle the fish before it is smoked. This will help prevent bacteria from groing while the fish is curing in the smoke.

When to Use Cold Smoking

Cold smoking is very difficult, and even impossible in the summer months, because the outside air temperature is normally as hot as or hotter than the temperature needed for true cold smoking. The best time to use cold smoking is during the winter months when the days are typically cooler.

I’ve wanted to give cold smoking a try and when Ian Mckend the owner of Mac’s BBQ, Ltd in England offered to send me a new “cold smoke” generator to try I jumped at the chance.

I’ve had the product for several months but with the temperatures in the Sacramento area over 100 degrees during the summer it’s hard to cold smoke anything when you can’t get your bbq pit below 125 degrees and that’s without a fire in it.  Now that the temperatures have cooled off I decided to give it a try.

I decided to use one of my Weber Smokey Mountain smokers for the cold smoking experiment.  After giving the whole thing a good cleaning I set out to smoke some sausages I recently purchased from Lockeford Meat and Sausage Company in Lockeford, California

There are a variety of smoke generation products on the market today.  But I don’t think there is one that can beat the “ProQ Cold Smoke Generator.”  For pure simplicity and ease of use it would be almost impossible to beat Ian’s new product.   I’m going to have to order some more wood dust to try this out again.  When I smoked my recent bacon experiment it would have been so much easier to have used this to generate the smoke.   I’m no where near an expert in cold smoking but as far as I can tell Ian has come up with another winning product.