Received a fish smoker as a present. Any advice on how to smoke the trout?

Neil

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This do?

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GAIC Single Handed Casting Instructor

http://www.andygreyfishing.com/

Andy - I am quite shocked!

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[COLOR="Blue"]"A fish seen is a fish nearly caught"[/COLOR]

Is it a cold smoker or a hot smoker?

Neil,

I for one am quite fond of smoked trout.

For me, it's as much about curing of it as the smoking of it, and most of this is of course is rather a matter of personal taste and preference and therefore somewhat subjective. I would encourage experimenting with both cures and types of woodchip.

My personal preference is for dry curing for about 24 hours prior to smoking in a mix of about 50% salt, 45% sugar, and 5% pepper and mixed herbs. The 100% value should be about the same weight as the trout.

Basically, gut and clean the trout. Fillet it if you wish.
Prepare your cure and fully cover the fillets or whole trout, and leave in the fridge. This will extract a good deal of the moisture from the flesh.
After about 24 hours of curing, wash-off all the cure residue and pat dry with a paper towel.

Hot smoke with hickory chips and a few bay-leaves for about half an hour. Good to eat either hot or cold, and can be an excellent constituent in pate or mousse.

Cold Smoke with hickory or cherry chips for about 5 hours. Good to eat right away, and will also keep ages in the fridge.

Either-way, both options also freeze well too.

As I say, part of the fun and interest is experimenting to achieve your own personal 'smoke of the house'.

Good luck



Aidan

I find that difficult to believe!

A more sensible answer would be hickory chips as per a previous answer.
The dry curing (as per gravlax) is simply delicious and can be done prior to smoking, either hot or cold. You do however need quite a big fish to make this worthwhile. Imagine the best smoked salmon you have ever had and multiply by 10.

Andy

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GAIC Single Handed Casting Instructor

http://www.andygreyfishing.com/

I hot smoked trout last night and was the best I have tasted.

Need to salt the fish as this helps it absorb the smoke flavour. I scored the skin and rubbed in a generous dose of sea salt. I then marinaded it in whisky, honey and garlic salt.

Once I got the smoker going I added a splash of whisky to the trivet and would occasionally splash the fish with the remains of the marinade while it was smoking, to keep it moist.

Whip some creme freche with horseradish and serve while the fish is still warm

If you are cold smoking the temperature is critical, not to allow the area with the fish in to get over 30 degrees otherwise you will loose that lovely texture.

If yer want to know about SMOKING the this site is a mine field of info www.sausagemaking.org :: Index plus yer can get ingredients from the main site sausagemaking .org doing sme dry cured bacon at the mo

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