Home Food Smoking

The process of smoking food was begun out of simple survival. Meats hung in smoky huts and caves were found to last longer than ‘unpreserved’ meats. This accidental discovery from a smoky fire gave early man a way of saving food in times of plenty, and became a part of the survival of the fittest, or cleverest.

Smoking now offers a way of improving or changing the taste of foods. Unfortunately, this also has led to artificial smoking, where food is dipped or sprayed with artificial smoke flavouring.

A few years ago I saw a programme with Dick Strawbridge ( a bit of a hero of mine, from his Scrapheap Challenge days, through to a number of programmes around sustainable living), where he, and his son James, made a simple smoker from a barrel.  I was then given their ‘smoking’ book last Christmas and I was away.

Following our principles of doing what we can for ourselves, I decided that it really was simple and would give it a go. I started with a ‘hot coal vacuum cleaner extension’ from Aldi (our favourite supermarket, but that’s another post), for my drum, and then made a cold smoking container on my forge, based on a bee smoker. Hey presto, a food smoker was born.

We have some friends visiting from Germany this week, so the smoker came out yesterday in preparation. Smoked food is much better if left for a day or two; it allows the smoke to permeate into the food and become smoother in taste.

I use hard woods for smoker fuel, a by-product of my wood carving, as softwoods contain excess tar that makes the food taste bitter.

smoking salmonStage 1 for wild salmon fillets is to cure in a sugar and salt mix for 6 hours. This pulls out moisture from the fish and begins the curing process.

 

 

 

 

smoking salmon stage 2Stage 2 and it is loaded into the drum. The fish is going onto the bottom, so that it doesn’t drip onto the cheese and other foods.

 

 

 

 

smoking cheese and garlicStage 3 and the cheese, eggs and garlic go onto the second shelf.  Note that anything likely to drip is in an aluminium food container.

 

 

 

 

 

 

smokerStage 4 and the separate fire box is alight. As noted above, it is designed to work exactly like my bee smoker, providing cold smoke to the food.

 

 

 

 

food smoingStage 5  and the smoke is  directed through a tube into the main container and out through a grill (OK, its a tea strainer I bought in a pound shop). This stops any undesirables flying into the food.

As the fire box is quite small I refill it after abut 30 minutes. This gives me a total smoking time of about 1 hour to 1 1/2 hours. This is much less than some recommend but I find that it is surprising how little smoke is required to give a good smoky taste, against smoking for preservation.

 

smoked foodhome smoked salmonAnd here they are, the finished smoked products. I won’t go on about how lovely they taste, but just try a couple of cloves of smoked garlic next time you cook, or egg sandwiches with smoked egg mayonnaise.  Delicious.