It is difficult to find a person who is able to refuse the use of smoked meat, fish or poultry - dishes that exude a unique aroma and look great, not to mention the taste of such products. But not everyone wants to buy smoked ready-made delicacies in the store, as their quality is sometimes questionable.
Therefore, in order to be sure of the freshness of smoked foods and forget about going to the supermarket for your favorite treats forever, you can purchase a ready-made smokehouse or build it yourself. But in order to enjoy the taste of smoked products prepared with your own hands, you need to understand the principle of operation of such equipment.
General concepts of the process of smoking products
The procedure for smoking any product involves a kind of heat treatment of food with the help of smoke generated from smoldering wood chips or sawdust. At the same time, food supplies are saturated with specific aromas of fruit trees, losing excess moisture and increasing the shelf life of finished products.
To date, there are only 2 types of smoking - cold and hot. During cold processing of products, the temperature in the smokehouse does not exceed 25 ° C, and the process itself stretches for several days. In turn, with hot smoking, the finished product is obtained in two hours, since the temperature of the smoke inside the smokehouse reaches 120 ° C.
I would like to draw attention to the fact that food that is prepared through cold smoke processing has enough long shelf life. However, such a cooking apparatus is very complicated to manufacture. At the same time, regardless of the method of processing products, it is necessary to qualitatively prepare them for the smoking process.
How to prepare products for the smoking procedure
The preparatory process before smoking meat or fish products is quite responsible, therefore, it must be treated with due attention.
- The edibles used for smoking are rubbed with salt in advance and marinated in their own juice for at least 5 days. If a frozen product is being prepared, then the time it takes to marinate increases.
- The most important quality of salt is the destruction of harmful microorganisms that die due to loss of moisture in meat, poultry or fish.
- After pickling, the product is dried, for which it is removed from excess moisture and left in a room with good ventilation. At the same time, it is very important to ensure that insects do not land on future smoked delicacies.
Only after all the processes discussed above can one proceed to the direct smoking of meat or fish.
The main differences between cold smoking and hot smoking
The main difference between cold and hot smoking methods is temperature in the pot. At the same time, the temperature difference when processing food with smoke is significant in various ways and can reach 90 ° C. Due to such a large run-up, the organoleptic qualities of the end product of smoking are very different.
Therefore, we can conclude that smokehouses for hot and cold food processing - mechanisms are structurally similar, but the taste result of the finished product is very different.
During hot smoking, due to the high temperature, the products are not easily smoked, but also are baked at the same time. Moreover, this cooking option will not take more than a few hours. But the shelf life of finished products is minimal, in contrast to the technology of smoking products with cold smoke. The shelf life of hot smoked meat and fish does not exceed a few days in the refrigerator.
Despite the speed of cooking with hot smoke, most people prefer cold smoking. This is due to the fact that the final product, in addition to acquiring an interesting taste, can be stored for quite a long time even without a refrigerator.
Raw materials for smoked products
The basis of most homemade ice makers is the smoke from an open fire. Therefore, for its operation, sawdust or chips are needed, due to which the combustion of fuel will be maintained.
Therefore, to obtain the most delicious and exquisite smoked delicacy, it is advisable as a base for chips or sawdust choose fruit trees- apple, peach, cherry, etc. In the smoke generator, wood slowly smolders due to the lack of a large amount of oxygen, emitting smoke at the temperature necessary for smoking.
At the same time, the taste of smoked products is very strong. affects the type of wood. The following properties of the final product will depend on the type of wood from which the sawdust or chips are made:
- color characteristics;
- aroma of a smoked product;
- palatability of food.
How to properly store smoked foods
It is important to understand that not only cooking, but also proper storage of smoked products is of great importance. So, with hot smoking, the maximum allowable shelf life of products in the refrigerator does not exceed 4 days, as such food belongs to perishable products. However, you can still slightly increase the storage time if you wrap the products in a salted cloth.
With cold smoked products, everything is completely different. Food prepared in this way can be preserved up to 6 months and even more. A high-quality smoke generator is able to evenly process products, which greatly affects the shelf life. At the same time, in order to properly preserve the smoked delicacy, there are a number of simple rules.
If you follow such simple rules for smoking and storing products of both cold and hot cooking methods, a person will constantly delight himself and his guests with delicacies from fish, meat or poultry. At the same time, all culinary masterpieces can be made in your own own smoke generator from fresh edibles without worrying about the taste and quality of the final product.
This type of smoking is especially common among lovers of tasty and juicy smoked meats that do not require long cooking. The main difference is the smoking temperature. It ranges from 45 to 120 degrees, and in time the process usually takes no more than two hours, in rare cases the process can take up to 4-5 hours. After cooking, the food acquires a golden hue, becomes juicy and very fragrant - this is also one of the features of hot smoking.
And hot-smoked dishes do not require additional drying or wilting. They are immediately ready for use, which cannot be said about the opposite method of smoking.
All you need to cook juicy chicken or mackerel right in your own kitchen is a small cylindrical smokehouse. This simple device can cook several kilograms of product at a time. Moreover, it does not require special intervention: loaded food, wood chips, put on heat and that's it. The device will do the rest.
Distinctive features of cold smoking
Cold smoking is a technologically more complex process, it requires additional processing of the product, in particular, good salting. In this case, the ambassador can last up to 2 weeks. The smoking temperature during this process does not exceed 30 degrees, so the processing process takes a much longer time - such smoking can drag on for several weeks or more. But usually it lasts from 3 to 6 days.
Products retain more useful properties when cold smoked due to drying. Due to exposure to smoke, foods also become surprisingly tasty and fragrant. The color of products smoked in this way will be gold or cherry.
Cooking cold-smoked products is not difficult if you use the right equipment. An excellent option would be cold smoked smoke generators. These devices are convenient and compact, and they can be used even in city apartments.
Which method is better and more efficient?
"What is the best way?" - you ask. It all depends on what goals you set for yourself. Each of the methods has its pros and cons. If we consider the technical side, then, of course, hot smoking wins. It requires less time for the cooking process itself, for processing raw materials before smoking. To taste smoked fish, you do not have to wait long before the fish is salted and then smoked.
The main disadvantage of hot smoking will be a shorter shelf life of the finished dish compared to cold.
Despite the fact that cold smoking lasts much longer, it has its undeniable advantages. The most important advantage is that minerals, amino acids and other substances useful to humans are perfectly preserved in products.
The long shelf life of the cooked dish is another very important plus of cold smoking. On average, it is 2 weeks. At the same time, throughout the entire period of storage, smoked meats perfectly retain their useful properties.
You can learn a little more about smoking
The process of smoking meat and fish came to us from ancient times and is still practiced. People continue to use this cooking technology, thanks to the excellent taste of the resulting products. Their incomparable aroma is achieved thanks to the smoke that the smoke generator produces for the smokehouse.
It is difficult to stop eating smoked foods. Given the simplicity of the process, it is easy to make do-it-yourself devices for preparing different dishes.
The technology may be as follows.
1. Hot smoking - cooking temperature up to 120°C.
2. Cold smoking - temperature not more than 35°C.
The cooking process requires a smokehouse - special equipment. It is bought in a store, but you can do it yourself, since the designs are not difficult and have their own characteristics for each type of smoking.
Smoke generating material
For the formation of smoke, wood is used, which does not emit harmful substances during combustion. It can be small chips, sawdust, briquettes or shavings. Stores sell bags of wood chips of different types of trees. Most used alder and juniper. You can also use rowan, hazel, aspen, apple, maple, oak, ash, birch. Each breed creates its own flavor. Some gourmets create mixtures with their own hands.
When preparing a home-made composition of wood chips, the bark is removed from the wood before splitting. This must be done, because it contains resins. This is especially true of birch and alder. Conifers are not used for smoking, since the resin is contained in the wood.
The size of the chips should not exceed 2-3 cm. For hot smoking, 200-300 g is enough for a 10-liter container. The chips are scattered on the bottom of the smokehouse and slightly moistened.
Hot smoking
Since hot smoking requires an elevated temperature, the chamber with the product and the smoke generator are combined. The simplest option is a bucket, pot or barrel with an airtight lid. Wood chips are poured to the bottom of the container, after which it remains to heat it from below from a heat source. Without access to air, the wood chips begin to smolder and give off smoke. Here it is important to create tightness and the necessary temperature conditions so that the products inside receive the necessary processing.
The simplest device can be made from a container in the form of a tightly closed pan. Tightness is created with the help of a screw tightening of the cover and an asbestos cord laid under it. Inside there is a tray for collecting fat, a grate for the product, as well as pins for hanging it. Components can be assembled in parts, but you can buy a finished product assembled. There won't be much difference in price. You can meet the price of no more than 1000 UAH.
A stationary smokehouse is installed on a personal plot when meat products or fish are regularly supplied. Before it is made, drawings and sketches are preliminarily drawn up. The smokehouse is installed under a canopy, on the windward side of the house. It is better to immediately make a device for hot and cold smoking at the same time.
The chamber is best made of brickwork. In it, a uniform temperature is achieved and a better product is obtained than in a metal one. The top cover of the chamber is sealed with asbestos cord or clay. A false ceiling is suspended under it with drains along the edges for condensate. This makes it possible to evenly distribute the smoke.
To maintain smoldering, holes or slits are made in the lower part of the chamber. To remove excess smoke, the top is connected with a thin pipe. The heating mode is controlled by a thermometer.
The smoke in the chamber can be created internally or by using a separate stove with an outlet pipe through which it is fed into the smokehouse. It is better to make it from stone with your own hands. To increase productivity, you can additionally use an ejector and a compressor. If you cool it, you can create a cold smoking mode. In this case, the pipe is replaced with a long one (more than 1.5 m).
When hot smoking, it is important not to create too high a temperature inside. The whole process is divided into 2 stages. First, drying is performed at a temperature of 80-90°C for 25% of the total time. Then it is increased to 120°C and maintained at this level until the end. The product inside should be smoked, not boiled.
It is advisable to measure the temperature inside with a thermometer. In its absence, you can roughly determine the heating by drops of water on the lid. It should evaporate, not sizzle. The temperature inside is maintained by changing the intensity of the heat source outside. An electric stove with step-by-step regulation of the heating power is well suited for this.
In the process of mastering the technology, the container is periodically opened and the readiness of the product is checked. After mastering this, you no longer have to do it.
Cold smoking
The method provides for a more thorough preparation of the product. It must be well salted and dried. Wet raw materials require longer processing. Cold smoking lasts longer because it requires the application of chilled smoke. This requires a certain skill, since any change in the design and cooking technology leads to different results. For example, the smoking process depends on the intensity of smoke production and the moisture content of the wood chips. The appearance of a golden crust and a special taste depend on this.
A distinctive feature is the separation of the smokehouse and the smoke generator. The latter contains a heat source, material for producing smoke, a cooling system and a compressor for supplying smoke to the smoking chamber. Energy production depends on the specific conditions. At home, it is preferable to use gas and electricity, and outdoors, the source of heat can be any.
To automate the process, it is best to use an electric heater placed in the wood chips or from below. To get smoke, it is turned on, after which the wood begins to smolder. At a smoke temperature of 35°C, the current supply is stopped by a signal from a temperature sensor located in the smokehouse. Without air access and in the absence of additional heating, combustion stops and the heater turns on again when the temperature in the chamber drops to the set value. In this way, you can do without visual control for many hours. It is only necessary occasionally to lay material to obtain smoke. Such devices are used with the constant use of a smokehouse.
Structurally, it is convenient to make a smoke generator from a profile pipe with a section of 10x10 cm and a length of about 60 cm. The bottom is removable for easy removal of combustion products. There is also a hole drilled to ignite the wood. A tight cover is made on top, and an ejector is assembled from plumbing fittings and tubes inside. Through it, the smoke is supplied by a stream of air into the smokehouse. The blower is an aquarium compressor with a capacity of 1.5 l / min.
A do-it-yourself compressor can be built from a cooler from a computer or a kitchen fan placed in plastic bottles. The ejector creates traction, due to which the wood chips are better ignited and their smoldering is maintained.
If you install an ash pan with a blower, a grate and a control damper, you can create a natural draft that provides smoke to the smokehouse. Then the compressor can not always be turned on.
The smoke is cooled by increasing the length of the hose to more than one meter. This reduces the temperature in the cabinet. When using additional smoke cooling with running water, it is possible to maintain a given thermal regime of cold smoking. This method complicates the design of the system. A simpler solution is to supply smoke through an inclined pipe buried in the ground.
If you connect the outlet of the smoke generator directly to the smokehouse, you can make hot smoking. At the same time, electric heating elements installed in the lower part of the cabinet are also used. Thus, due to the length of the elastic hose and additional heating on one device, you can create different modes of smoking the product.
Conclusion
There is nothing better than a do-it-yourself smokehouse! The technology of smoking is not difficult and everyone can master it. To do this, you need to learn the basic rules of smoking. Here it is important to choose the right modes and composition of wood, depending on the product.
Delicious smoked fish can evoke truly amazing, special emotions in every person who shows a desire to reveal the real facets of cooking. At the same time, it should be noted a significant difference between hot and cold smoking technologies, since only with this approach will it be possible to enjoy a pleasant and harmonious taste.
Features of hot smoking
This technique is ideal for lovers of smoked fish. Hot technology improves the taste characteristics of the product, making it soft and juicy. However, to prepare a special dish, you need to observe a certain temperature regime. When using the method, the temperature should be from 45 to 125 degrees, and it is allowed to increase the indicator to 150 degrees.
Hot smoking requires forty minutes to two hours. Despite this, the duration of the procedure can be delayed up to a day (24 hours).
After cooking a delicious smoked fish, a beautiful golden hue is expected. Any fish that is cooked by hot smoking does not involve drying, drying. Use becomes possible immediately.
What is cold smoking?
Cold smoking involves a long and specific procedure. Moreover, the fish involves additional preparation, including salting. Salting fish can take anywhere from a couple of days to two weeks.
Smoked salted fish is carried out at a temperature of thirty degrees. This assumes a significant duration of the culinary process. Fish can take three to five days to cook, sometimes taking a month or more.
The cold-smoked product can be preserved by drying. The smoke that comes from a smoldering fire gives an amazing aroma, a special taste with spicy notes. Smoked fish can take on a special color, ranging from light beige to brown.
Cold smoking is actively used for sausages, oily fish, including salmon, mackerel, as the technique allows you to maintain the optimal density of the product and even increase it. When cut, the fish will not crumble, as the meat will acquire density and will be best attached to the bones of the fish.
Which way to choose: hot or cold?
Both methods have advantages and disadvantages.
- The hot smoking method, without a doubt, has technical advantages. The culinary process requires less time to cook fish and prepare raw materials. For cooking, you do not need to wait a few days, as the fish will immediately be able to please with an amazing taste. In addition, the product can be tasted immediately after the successful completion of the culinary process. However, hot smoking does not allow you to store cooked fish for a long time, as it will only keep fresh for a week at a temperature of no more than +5 degrees.
- Cold smoking will require more time, but at the same time it has worthy advantages. It is this technology that allows the fish to preserve all the vitamins and other useful components, since a strong thermal effect is completely eliminated. Cold smoking allows you to cook fish that will not only be healthy, but can also be stored for a long time (about two weeks) without any negative manifestations. However, in order for the fish to be enjoyed as long as possible, it should be stored in the refrigerator at a temperature of 0 to +5 degrees.
Only the culinary specialist can decide which option is best to choose: hot or cold smoked. This is due to the result to be achieved, because advantages and disadvantages can be manifested in each of the two cases.
What are the health benefits of smoked fish?
Fresh fish has vitamins, minerals and other useful components. However, is there any benefit from smoked fish?
- Smoked fish, which is cooked using thermal influence, will certainly change its chemical composition. The high temperature of exposure leads to a decrease in nutrients.
- If basic principles are violated during cooking, there is a risk that smoked fish will harm human health. In this case, the formation of carcinogens and other toxic compounds is expected, which immediately increase the risk of developing cancer.
- Cold smoking offers less impact, which increases the chances of retaining nutrients.
- Smoked fish is a real delicacy that has managed to win recognition almost all over the world. The most important thing is to understand the principles by which smoked fish is cooked, because only in this case you can count on the maximum benefit.
- Some types of smoked fish, including herring, herring, can be a worthy basis of the daily diet.
- Before deciding on the inclusion of smoked fish in the diet, it is necessary to take into account not only the method of preparation (hot or cold technology), but also the calorie content, the initial raw material.
Smoked fish can be healthy and tasty, but only if it is cooked correctly, regardless of the technology used.
Cold and hot smokingImmediately before smoking, a fire is made and allowed to flare up well, while the chimney is covered with asbestos-cement or metal sheets. From above or across the barrel, rods are inserted into the holes, on which the prepared products are suspended. From above, the barrel is tied with a dense cloth (burlap), which is necessary to regulate the amount of smoke passing through the smokehouse, as well as the temperature. That is, depending on the smoke temperature in the smokehouse at the moment, the fabric is either removed, or vice versa - the barrels are pulled on top. The duration of smoking at a temperature of 23-25 o C will be about 4 days. Products are suspended only after the hearth is hot enough. Cooked foods must be dry, as soot and ash will inevitably settle on wet foods.
For a cold smoking method, the hearth can be replaced by a stove. At the same time, there is no need to cut the bottom of the barrel, it is enough to make a hole for the pipe in its lower part. The smoker pipe should not sit loose in the hole, it should fit very tightly.
For the hot smoking method, the smokehouse is somewhat redone. In this case, the fire will need to be built directly under the barrel. The smoke temperature is maintained within 50-60 o With, and the duration of smoking will be about half a day.
In the process of smoking meat, it is recommended to use dry firewood with the addition of sawdust from hardwood trees. In addition to the fact that raw firewood burns slowly, they also cause a lot of inconvenience - they increase the humidity of the smoke, soot inevitably sticks to the surface of the cooked products, and their appearance becomes unappetizing. Good firewood is obtained from beech, alder, ash, etc. It is unacceptable to heat the smokehouse with spruce or pine firewood, in which case the pungent smell of resin will spoil the taste of the products. Sprigs of rosemary, juniper, almond shells, various aromatic herbs should be thrown into the fire from time to time.
Examples of a mini smokehouse
When you want to smoke a small amount of food in a hot way, in some cases it is quite possible to get by with an ordinary bucket or similar container with a lid. In this case, a tray (a grate with holes) is placed on the bottom, and several holes are made in the upper part of the bucket for rods with hooks (the products for smoking will be hung on them).
Also, instead of a bar, a grate can be installed on the rack, choosing it according to the size of the racks. A small hole should be made in the upper part of the smokehouse to let the smoke out.
First of all, a layer of sawdust or hardwood shavings about 4 cm thick is poured onto the container. Then the fixture is installed and the products are hung. After that, the bucket is covered with a lid and put on fire for a short time, until the chips begin to smolder. As soon as this happens, the fire is reduced. The duration of smoking directly depends on the type of products and their mass and, as a rule, is 20-40 minutes. Cooked products must first be wrapped with gauze so that soot does not sit on them.
For hot smoked a sufficiently large number of products use a barrel without a bottom, and a fire is bred directly under the barrel.
For cold smoked barrels are also used, but with a bottom.
For this option, the smokehouse cuts out the bottom of the barrel. Then they dig a hole with a diameter just under the barrel and a depth of 40 cm. Next, they dig a groove-chimney, making it at an angle to the hearth (hole) in which the fire will be built. The barrel is installed on bricks, placing metal rods under it, and the space between the barrel and the bricks is well smeared with clay. It is best to lay out the hearth with brick or stone. In the process of smoking, the hearth and chimney are covered with metal sheets.
For this option, holes are made in the upper part of the barrel, into which rods are inserted, and the products are hung on hooks. The barrel is installed on bricks, and a hole is cut in its lower part for a pipe through which smoke will flow into the barrel. The stove is placed at a distance of 3-5 m and connected to the barrel through a pipe. From above, the barrel is covered with burlap during the smoking process.
