Smoked Salmon
Salmon cured then smoked — cold smoked long and slow for lox you eat raw, or hot smoked until it flakes. The cure does the preserving; the smoke does the flavor. From Back to Basics (Abigail Gehring).
Ingredients
- 1 salmon, filleted or cut into thick steaks
Spicy dry cure
- 1 lb salt
- 2 lb sugar
- 2 oz allspice
- 2 oz crushed cloves
- 2 oz mace
- 2 oz white pepper
- 2 oz crushed bay leaves
Brine cure (alternative)
- 5 quarts water
- 3 lb salt
- 2 cups brown sugar
- 2 tablespoons onion powder
- 2 tablespoons oregano
Instructions
Dress the salmon: remove the strip of fat near the dorsal fin but leave the rest of the skin on. Clean the central cavity, then fillet the fish, or cut it into thick steaks if it is large.
To dry cure, mix the spicy cure ingredients thoroughly. Pack the fillets or steaks in the mixture and cure 8 to 12 hours. Rinse and dry the fish.
To brine cure instead, submerge the fillets or steaks in the brine 1 to 2 hours, then let them drain.
Cold smoke at 90°F for 8 hours in light smoke, then increase the smoke density and hold for another 18 to 48 hours, depending on how strong you want it.
To hot smoke instead, hold at 170°F until the flesh flakes.
Store in the refrigerator.
Notes
Keep the fish cold while it is in the brine. It is not preserved at that stage and will spoil if it sits warm.
The smoke does not preserve the fish. The cure and the drying do. Do not shorten the cure because you plan to smoke it longer.
Wood changes the result more than anything else: apple is mild and clean, cherry is strong and better suited to red meat, hickory and oak sit in between.
Cold smoked and thoroughly cured is lox, eaten raw. Hot smoked is cooked through and flakes apart.
Photo: François Bianco, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0.