BearCarvers smoked salmon recipe with a busted MES.

[Grogger27]

Good day folks. I have been fairly excited today as I had brined some small slabs of salmon with BearCarvers recipe. Late last night I pulled them from the brine and layed them across my MES racks in the basement fridge. I got called into work early this morning so I couldn't get them started then but was able to get things started at lunch time with strict instructions to the wife on when to raise temp. When I got home I realized I must have a loose connection to the element as it hadn't broke 105'F and the wife already had moved the setting to 140.
:mad::mad::mad::mad:
So, into emergency mode I go and fired up some small charcoal and fired it into the wood chamber of the MES.
I sure hope the fish ain't wrecked.

I needed to vent, so this was my bitch. Thanks for listening. I will post updates when I'm done.

[Richtee]

Arrggh.... well, the brine may have saved you tho.... was there cure in it? I always cure my salmon. Even if not the salt-sugar bought ya some time.

[Mark R]

Arrggh.... well, the brine may have saved you tho.... was there cure in it? I always cure my salmon. Even if not the salt-sugar bought ya some time.

Rich...go look at a recipe for Gravlox. No cure(except salt and sugar), cold smoked for days sometimes! If the fish is bad you can smell it quick. It's not like meat containing hemoglobin.

Actually, I don't think I've ever seen a recipe for curing fish that had "cure" in it. Just salt, sugar and/or vinegar, again no hemoglobin, not the same set of chemistry or bad bugs.

[Richtee]

Pretty sure they do have hemoglobin. With the exception of

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channichthyidae

All earth life does in varying degrees.

But it's not about that. It's about not allowing C.Bot in. And it does not care if hemoglobin is present or not.

[ExhaustedSpark]

Im lost as bear carver is a fan of mortons cure. I that what you used??

[Grogger27]

Well I think it turned out good.

They look great. So I tried one. It tasted awesome. I tried a thinner piece and it was a little salty, so when BearCarver says to pull the thinner pieces out of the brine at 4 hours, do so. Other wise it tasted great. And the wife give a thumbs up.:thumbup:
On a side note, I did slather on a brown sugar / maple syrup mixture onto the fish just before throwing them into the smoker.
As far as wandering in the danger zone too long, I ain't got the shits yet, so I doubt I have any bacteria issues while I had smoker problems.
Thanks for checking this out.

[rbranstner]

Some day I need to try out Bears salmon recipe. Looks great!

[Bearcarver]

Nice Job Grogger!!!

This is the first I saw this thread, and your Salmon looks Great!!


To answer some of the questions, No I haven't used any cure on any fish so far, not to say I won't in the future.

It took me 7 full smoker batches of Salmon to perfect this Smoke, and nobody around here had any problems with squirts, or anything like that from any of those 7, plus the confirmation batch #8.
Also everyone that I know of who used my Step by Step has loved it, just like Grogger. (And that's a lot of people!!)

Bear

[Slanted88]

That Cat nailed it! Best...if we can get some Blue Beer & eatz!