{"id":149,"date":"2021-05-20T15:04:56","date_gmt":"2021-05-20T15:04:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/?p=149"},"modified":"2021-05-20T15:09:29","modified_gmt":"2021-05-20T15:09:29","slug":"speaking-of-salmon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/?p=149","title":{"rendered":"Speaking of Salmon…"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

One minor drawback to being a Midwesterner is that being landlocked leaves one without a consistent source of fresh seafood. This tragedy hardly dulls my passion for salmon and it remains one staple I tend to purchase at least weekly. Lately, I have been playing with some more ways of cooking salmon which included a curry salmon stew (for which I can\u2019t take credit as I found it on another recipe blogger\u2019s site, which I\u2019d gladly link if I could remember where it was…), smoked salmon ravioli and my all-time weeknight favorite, crispy skin salmon. Salmon is pretty forgiving in terms of cook times and it pairs so well with many flavor profiles. An added bonus is that the kids will it eat it… usually. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My husband recently delved into preparing food in a smoker as pandemic hobby number 258. We bought an affordable electric smoker at Home Depot to see if it was a method we would use frequently or if it would be another neglected device relegated to the garage graveyard or basement of forgotten toys. I love all the smoky goodness he has produced and decided to try my hand at smoking fish. Our family favorite so far has been smoked trout, but the smoked salmon is also amazing. I know I will love smoked halibut soon, but my first batch was a little too heavily brined and I could only eat a little before I felt my ankles swelling. As I decided to write this blog post, my husband offered up a joke (classic dad style): \u201cIf smoking is so bad for you, why does it cure salmon?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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If you decide to smoke salmon at home, it isn\u2019t difficult, but keep a few key points in mind. First, I recommend buying larger fillets of good quality. The larger, thicker fillets will allow for slow smoking without getting too dry. The pieces above were from one of my early attempts. All pieces were great, but for the time investment, it is worth doing a decent sized batch. I precut the larger fillet for ease of serving and storing as slicing after smoking can leave raggedy edges. The second key point is brining and drying prior to smoking. There\u2019s another blogger\/chef\/hunter I geek out over who has a great tutorial on smoking fish. I took his advice on creating the pellicle seriously and wasn\u2019t disappointed. You can check out his site https:\/\/honest-food.net\/how-to-smoke-salmon-recipe\/<\/a> for some great tips. Essentially, you brine the fish in a salted sugar solution and then allow it to dry in a drafty, cool place. He also talks about slow, low temperature, hot smoking fish to seal in moisture. This is the third important thing to remember: smoke at a low temperature (I start at about 130o<\/sup>F and gradually increase to a final temp of about 175o<\/sup>-180o<\/sup>). The white junk that seeps out if smoked too fast\/hot is albumin (you can see a small amount in the photo above). I tried pushing the temperature up on a subsequent attempt and learned the hard way that not only is the albumin leak unattractive, but it leaves a pretty dry fish. Fortunately, the dry result inspired my smoked salmon ravioli which was delicious, so if this happens to you, DO NOT trash your result!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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If we end up investing in a more substantial smoker, I will gladly update my blog, but for now, this little electric device seems to be a welcome addition to our food prep arsenal! We are always looking for great family meals, so please let me know if you smoke fish at home and how your family likes to eat it! I\u2019ll post a couple salmon recipes next and would love feedback if you try them. Happy cooking!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One minor drawback to being a Midwesterner is that being landlocked leaves one without a consistent source of fresh seafood. This tragedy hardly dulls my passion for salmon and it remains one staple I tend to purchase at least weekly. Lately, I have been playing with some more ways of cooking salmon which included a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[7],"tags":[5,6],"class_list":["post-149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cooking","tag-fish","tag-salmon"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=149"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":153,"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149\/revisions\/153"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/minnetopia.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}