Thursday, June 30, 2011

Smokin' Good

Now that we have frozen and canned a winter's worth of Sockeye, we turned our attention to the smoker. For our anniversary last year I bought Chris a Bradley electric smoker.



We decided to make some candied salmon this time. The recipe is simple, when you have fresh beautiful Sockeye the key is to not add too many flavours.

4 fish (8 fillets) fills our smoker perfectly - the fish we chose averaged 6lbs each.

Filet and skin the fish. Cut the salmon into thin strips.



Combine 1kg of Demerara brown sugar, 1 cup coarse salt, and 1 cup molasses. Layer the salmon with the sugar mixture in a glass or plastic container with a lid (do not use metal)


Store the container in the refrigerator for 24-48 hours. Stir every 8 hours to move the top pieces to the bottom.

When you are ready to smoke, lightly rinse the salmon under cold water to remove excess salt and lay out on the smoker racks. Do not forget to spray the racks with a non-stick spray to make removal and cleanup easier.

Place the pieces on the racks according to size. Different thickness will require different smoking times.



Allow the fish to dry until tacky. Do not rush this step! It could take an couple of hours. The extra moisture from the rinsing will not allow the salmon to smoke consistently. You can speed up the process by positioning a fan nearby.

Once you are ready to smoke your fish just follow the instructions on your smoker. For our Bradley we used smoke only (oven off) for 3 hours. There are many different bisquettes available for the Bradley, this time we use a Crown Royal flavoured one.


The smallest pieces were removed and another two hours was needed for the thicker pieces.


Once removed from the smoker I glazed the pieces with maple syrup and let them sit again until dry.


Now you can enjoy your candied salmon! I had to vacuum seal and freeze some right away before it all disappeared.


- Posted by Pink Waders from my iPhone

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