Emergency need for salmon smoker plans

Glenn, Here is a link , have a look at it and a smoker is pretty easy to work out.

My Own smoker (I trout fish almost everyday) Is made of corrogated iron . The frame is of 1" tube and three sides are all 36" wide and 6' tall the fourth side is the door and it is the same but with hinges down one side. I have it sitting up on two courses of concrete blocks with a 6" steel tube going to the fire box. the SS frames that the fish sit on are spaced about

12" apart and sit on angle . It all took me about 4 hours to build.

Glenn My Grandfathers smoke house was wood. Imagine the classical outhouse. About 3' on a side and a small woodstove inside. It was about 7' tall. We put 4-5 racks of fish or duck or other meat in the unit and smoked for 24 hours. We burned fruit wood in stove and all was ok. If wood just don't build a roaring fire. You really want a small fire that keeps the smoke going and the temp going. lg no neat sig line.

Any reasonable sized metal box will work. Clean 50 gal drum, clean 30 gal drum, old METAL interior refrigerator, etc. Get a hot plate and a 160 degree thermostat, and you are set to go. Around here, the old refrigerator is the ticket. Open burner hot plate (thrift store) and a furnace fan cutout thermostat from a new or used forced air furnace. Some of the guys use an electric frypan, already has the thermostat, toss the smoker wood on the griddle and let it smoke.

If you want to build one, pick a size that works for you, just build a box with sheet sides and angle corners. Removable lid is quick and easy, a door is nice. Put the griddle on the floor, handle with theromstat out the side. Get a thermometer to stick in the side to check the temp.

For safety sake, you need to get the temp to 160 degrees as so> The old freezer crapped out this afternoon and we now have a critical

If you can find an old refigerator build a firebox in the area under the bottom where the drip tray is. Remove the bottom of the fridge. Wash out the interior and get as clean as you can. The old drip tray makes a handy tray for your burning charcoals. Drill a couple 1/2" holes on the top and upper rear area of the fridge to allow venting of some of the smoke. When you start your charcoal fire and throw a few damp wood chips of your coals ( I like mesquite or Hickory) close the door and check the interior temperature after about an hour. Adjust amount of charcoal and chips after that.Two or three oven temperature gauges placed in different parts of the fridge interior will tell you the best places to put your meat/fish that is to be smoked. Good luck, Dennis

I forgot to mention it in my first post but if this is an upright freezer you could probably do a little bit of modifying on it so you could use it. I suppose a chest type freezer could be used also although I have never done it with one of them. Dennis

I don't know anything about building smokers, but if you need help eating the stuff when you are done, give me a call :-)

Good luck. I'd hate to see that much red gold go to waste.

Not to be too exact, although I am a machinist... and a chef in training.

According to the NSF, and the training that I've received, the food danger zone is between 40 and 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

And Roy is very right, bacteria just love the area in between those temperatures, especially with Chicken and Fish. Both of those meats are a wonderful breeding ground for harmful bacterium.

Good luck with the smoking. Not too many things are much better in the world than smoked salmon on a bagel...

_kevin archibald

I need to do some more research while I build the smoker. The recipe I have for Nova is to soak it in a salt and brown sugar brine for 72 hours and cold smoke at 70º for 12 hours. That sounded like a recipe for botulism to me too.

I think maybe I better round up a Rabbi. :-)

Since it is an emergency, why don't you call your friends who do have a working freezer. I'm storing a couple of turkeys for a friend for exactly the same reason.

As an aside, I try to keep a lot of thermal mass in my freezer. I fill plastic mild jugs about 4/5 full of water and fill the empty space in the freezer. That will carry me through many days of no power. Not an unusual occurance during ice storms around here.

It's better for the freezer too. The compressor doesn't cycle as often as it would with less thermal mass.

Earle Rich Mont Vernon, NH

...>> danger zone is between 40 and 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

...>

maybe the brine takes care of the bacteria problem. it sounds like a Scandanavian "fish recipe". --Loren

.. as in the infamous Lutefisk (cod soaked in lye).

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

Do not EVER, EVER, EVER use the grillwork in a refer or freezer in a smoker or barbacue or anything combining heat and food.

A friend of ours, perhaps 55, grew up in a family that smoked meat on such grills, used the grills over camp fires, and who knows where else. He now has accumulated enough cadmium in his body that he is brain poisened. Can't concentrate, can't hold a job, etc. He doesn't want to endure the medical procedure to remove the cadmium from his body as it is very long and expensive.

So, beware!

Paul in Redmond, OR

Maybe it's just me, but I would think that if the power went out in an ice storm, you would just carry the frozen goods outside....?

Greetings Glenn, The solution you are using may indeed be OK. It depends on the salt and sugar content. Bacteria will grow only if the salt is low enough. Preserving foods by brining and smoking will retard bacteria growth if the salt content is high enough or if the water content is low enough. Smoking kills bacteria on the surface and just below the surface very well. Just look at hams that were brined and cold smoked and then hung for a year. Never brought up to 140 degrees and stiil no spoilage. Botulism will not grow if oxygen is present. I looked into getting some smoked meats tested for bacteria and the lab I spoke to said that even the cold smoke is full of really nasty substances called PAHs. Poly Aromatic Hydrocarbons. These are good sterilizers. If the recipie you are following has been used a lot then I wouldn't worry. ERS

The problem isn't so much during an ice storm where the temperatures can be just below freezing, but after the storm passes. The temperatures then can go well above freezing while the crews work to clear the damaged trees and lines. About 3 years ago, the entire northeast from Montreal south lost power for weeks. My relatives in Maine were without power for more than a week. Most of us with any sense have wood stoves and emergency generators for just such a storm again. Even today with strong winds, the power is flickering on and off with outside temperatures around 35F. Fortunately, I just installed an APC backup UPS that carries me through these outages while I continue to write.

Earle Rich Mont Vernon, NH

Man I've got to agree with that! I realize you have a problem on your hands, but what a nice problem.

JTMcC.

The salmon has been salted down and the smoker is now under construction. The old freezer had a plastic lining so it is a junker but I welded up a fire box and will make the smoke chamber tomorrow. The dimensions were dictated by some stainless wire racks that a neighbor had in his junk pile. I have some cherry and pecan wood scraps soaking so I can get good smoke and will report on the results.

Thanks to all for the suggestions.

Now, does any>>I don't know anything about building smokers, but if you need help eating

Thanks for the heads up on that. I had heard of that but I forgot to mention it in my post. Dennis