Smoking

[Tantalus]

just for the record all smoke is toxic in some way or another

it is the toxicity that kills the bugs and helps fresh meat keep longer once smoked

as for which woods to use, the germans smoke a lot of stuff over beech which is nice

for a really special flavour see if you can find some juniper wood

Tant

 

[george]

My favourite is a mixture of apple wood and oak.

George

 

[NickBristol]

Does anyone have any pics they can post of a simple smoker being prepared and in use, especially the biscuit tin / trangia combo? I think I can visualise it in my head but I think I'd better see before trying

 

[george]

Sorry Nick no pics but I can try to describe it.

You need a large biscuit tin, a trangia burner or similar, two or three metal coat hangers and some tinfoil .

Cut the metal coat hangers into lenghts that will reach from one side of your tin to the other and straighten them out. Pierce two holes on either side of the tin about an inch in from the sides and about an inch up from the bottom. Push a lenght of coat hanger through each side and out the other. Bend the ends down so they're held in place. About 2 inches above that pierce a row of six or eight holes on either side. When you poke wires through that gives you a kind of rack to put the food on that you want to smoke.

Scatter a couple of tablespoons of the sawdust of choice on the bottom of the tin. This works best with dust rather than chips IMO. Go to the two wires immediately above and wrap the tinfoil around them making a kind of tinfoil roof above the sawdust. This is to stop drippings from the food landing in the sawdust and stopping it smouldering. Make sure you leave gaps at either end for the smoke to come through.

Lay the food you want to smoke on the top layer of wire - the grill kind of thing that you made. Put on the lid after piercing four or five pencil thick holes in it. Not too many or it gets too cool inside. Prop the tin over the trangia burner on a couple of stones. Give the burner a good fill and let it burn with the simmer ring on until its burned out.

Open your tin and enjoy.

This is a hot smoker and cooks the food rather than just smoking it - works well with thin cuts that cook quickly - great for fish, but be careful that things are cooked all the way through - if in doubt either do it again or finish it of on the fire.

PS remember to burn any coatings off the tin and the wire before you use it - amazing what they coat things with.

Hope this makes sense.

George

 

[den]

I had one just like george has just mentioned but I used chicken wire for the platform, which the tin sits on and chicken wire for the tray inside the tin with an old tin can filled with meths for the burner.
Simple but worked a treat for eels and trout.

 

[Tyr]

I have done it in a tent, a lavvo to be precise and it worked a treat. juniper is a good tip as it does taste very nice. It is not hard to do. I guess the main thing is to make sure that whatever you are smoking doesn't get too hot, you don't want a big fire you want big smoke

 

[NickBristol]

Sorry Nick no pics but I can try to describe it.

George

Cheers for all the info george - I'm going to go try it this weekend. All I need do now is eat all the biscuits out of the tin

 

[spamel]

My brother in law is german, and got an old wood burning boiler from his father when he renovated his water system. It works just like a kelly kettle. Well he started cutting the boiler up, he chopped off the top, and the very bottom, and removed the chimney that runs up the centre. He then drilled holes at the top to put his hanging rods through. As they are threaded bars with nuts on the outside to hold them in place, he can remove them if he wants to smoke larger joints, etc.

He then got a large butterfly valve welded to the cut off top section of the boiler, which he balances on top as the lid. This is how he controls the smoke in the boiler, and it also ensures that the fire at the bottom of the boiler doesn't flare up, but smolders.

Due to it being a boiler, it has a small temperature guage on the side, and this helps him guage when to start certain stages of the smoking process. If the fire starts to burn, he smothers it with sawdust especially made for the job.

A very good use of an old bit of kit that would otherwise have been thrown away. I have had some of the trout he has smoked and it was excelllent. I get smoked trout from the shops here in germany, but it doesn't compare to fish that was caught that morning and smoked in the evening after a day being marinated in a secret recipe!

Anyway, a good thing at home, but not the sort of thing you'll take on the trail with you! How do you improvise in nature?

 

[Walkabout]

A really simple smoker is to just put your wood chips in the bottom of a wok and put a plate of what you want to smoke on top. Stick the lid on and heat over a flame (gas, Trangia, whatever) and there you go. This only hot smokes it unless you are really careful. My dad once used tea leaves, rice and sugar for the smoke producer. It made the whole house stink like cannabis and ruined the wok. :roll: :rolmao:

 

[ridge walker]

Just found this bit of kit for smoking fish, has anyone tried it or got one?
Is it any good or should i look for other ways of smoking fish?

Fish Smoker

Jay

 

[snerper]

A really simple smoker is to just put your wood chips in the bottom of a wok and put a plate of what you want to smoke on top. Stick the lid on and heat over a flame (gas, Trangia, whatever) and there you go. This only hot smokes it unless you are really careful. My dad once used tea leaves, rice and sugar for the smoke producer. It made the whole house stink like cannabis and ruined the wok. :roll: :rolmao:

I do it, BUT I use some tin foil in the bottom of the pan, tell your old feller to get out more often! IF you can get him down from the ceiling after inhaling all that good ****!

 

[hanzo]

I love smoked foods. I just use my grill as a smoker and have smoked salmon, sausages, meats, to turkeys in there.

Also, I am lazy so I don't use wood chips. I use about six inch chunks of kiawe (our local mesquite) and wood from our dragon eye fruit trees. Mango is also good. A couple of smoldering chunks of each wood gives a HUGE amount of smoke that is extremely fragrant and the food tastes terrific. I usually only need to add more wood when smoking a turkey which takes a while or sometimes even a chicken.