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Hello again and welcome back! This year has started off with a series of blog posts featuring things I have wanted to learn but for one reason or another procrastinated. This post focuses on curing and cold smoking, two areas covered in a great book named Charcuterie The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing
. For this cook I cured, then cold smoked a beautiful piece of farm raised salmon. Now sit back, grab a nice glass of Sauvignon Blanc, and enjoy this post for Big Green Egg Cold Smoked Salmon.
Big Green Egg Cold Smoked Salmon
Although there are a lot of moving parts to this recipe the cure used for the salmon was simple featuring just two ingredients: Coarse Salt & Brown Sugar.
Mix the salt and brown sugar well and place a layer on the bottom of a pan before laying the salmon on top. Then cover the salmon with the remainder of the salt, sugar mixture.
I moved the cured salmon to a deeper dish since the cure creates a brine when pulling the moisture from the fish. Here is the salmon after 36 hours in the cure.
After 24-48 hours, rinse the salmon under cold then place it in a bowl of cold water for 30 minutes to extract the salt.
Pull the salmon out of the water and place on a wire rack, then refrigerate (uncovered) overnight. This helps dry the salmon creating a surface the smoke will adhere to.
After the salmon sits overnight in the fridge it is time to set up your Big Green Egg for the cold smoke. I used the Amazen Pellet Smoker
with Apple Wood pellets
.
Fill the maze with the pellets.
Clean out all of the lump charcoal in your Big Green Egg so the fire box is empty. To light the pellet smoker, place on top of your grate, light the corner of the smoker with a butane torch, and let the flame burn for 10 minutes.
After 10 minutes, blow out the flame, and place the pellet smoker in the bottom of your fire box (mine sits on top of my Kick Ash Basket
below).
Keep the top and bottom vents all the way open and let the smoke billow from the Big Green Egg. Place your ConvEGGerator
legs up and then the grill grate on top to complete your set up.
Remember this is a COLD SMOKE so if you are doing this in weather above 70° Fahrenheit you need to add a tray of ice to your environment to keep temp under 90°. Fortunately, this cook was in February and it was 32° outside.
Once the pellet smoker has been producing smoke for another 10 minutes place your salmon inside on top of a wire rack on the grill grate. Close the dome and let the salmon smoke away for 6 to 12 hours.
For this cook, the salmon was ready at the 8 hour mark. As you can see the smoke was still going strong with this little pellet smoker!
Pull the smoked salmon from the Big Green Egg and place it on a large piece of butcher paper. Wrap and place in the refrigerator overnight before slicing and serving.
Big Green Egg Cold Smoked Salmon
Serve with lemon, chopped hard-boiled egg, sliced red onion, capers, cream cheese, and fresh bagels.
This was an amazing experience and one I look forward to doing again soon trying various aromatics for the salmon cure.
Big Green Egg Cold Smoked Salmon
Ingredients
- 2-3 Lbs. Salmon Filet
- 2 1/2 Cups of Coarse Salt
- 2 1/2 Cups of Brown Sugar
Instructions
- To make the cure:
- Combine the salt and brown sugar in a mixing bowl and mix well.
- Spread 1/3 of the cure over the bottom of a glass baking dish large enough to hold the fish.
- Lay the salmon on top of the cure.
- Spread the remaining cure on top of the salmon to cover the fish completely.
- Cover the dish with plastic wrap and cure the fish in your refrigerator for 24 to 48 hours.
- After 24-48 hours in the cure rinse the cure off the salmon under cold running water.
- Place the salmon in a large bowl and cover with cold water.
- Soak for 30 minutes, then drain well.
- Blot the salmon dry on both sides with paper towels.
- Lay the salmon on a wire rack over a sheet pan and let the salmon dry, uncovered, in the refrigerator over night.
- Fill your Amazen Pellet Smoker with Apple Wood pellets and light in one corner.
- Let the flame burn 10 minutes before blowing it out to produce the smoke.
- If you’re smoking the salmon on a warm day (temperature above 70 degrees), arrange the fish on a wire rack over a roasting pan filled with ice. (The fish should be at least 1 inch above the ice.)
- Empty out your fire box and place the Amazen Pellet smoker inside.
- Put the ConvEGGerator in the Big Green Egg for indirect cooking.
- Place the salmon on a wire rack in the Big Green Egg on top of the grill grate.
- Now cold smoke the salmon 6-12 hours. You will know when it is ready when it takes on that semi-firm and leathery look.
- Wrap the salmon in butcher paper and let it rest in the refrigerator overnight.
- Slice using a sharp knife diagonal to the fish, cut the salmon into paper-thin slices.
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Hey Chris…just asked about the firmness after curing…realizing that might be due to the fact that I left the skin on :/ thinking I need to filet that off before smoking, yes? Thanks again, Robb
Doesn’t have to do with the skin being left on. However, you want to remove the skin so that side of the fish can get as much smoke penetration as the other side!
I actually prefer the skin on because it makes it much easier to thinly slice, but that’s just my opinion. I typically do it 2 ways, skin on part and skin of an cut into 1/4″ wide strips because my son likes those pieces. The strips get SUPER smokey!!
Awesome, thanks!! Appreciate that! Feeling a little better…shes been in the fridge overnight and will get smoked later today or tomorrow!
PS…was able to get the skin off easily last night before it went into the fridge so Im good so far..
Hey Chris,
Just an update….smoked for what I think was 6hrs but I realized at some point my pellet maze died out…looks to be about half way thru the pellets. Has this happened to anyone on any regularity? The Salmon is definitely more firm after smoking but not like jerky stiff, thankfully… its not over salty or over smokey so I think it ended up ok despite the oddities above. Will be grabbing some capers and cream cheese for breakfast tomorrow! Thanks for your recipe guidance! Would love to know thoughts on the above….Robb
I usually only let it smoke for 3-4 hours anyway. I use Alder wood which is a bit less strong than some other woods, but from your description sounds like it came out great! I have had the pellets go out, but I use a pellet “tube” which I don’t think is as good as the maze. (I always leave the skin on too, but I’ve done it both ways with success) This last go round, I went wild on my dry brine, used cardamom, grapefruit zest and chili flake. Was awesome. Still have a time down here in the south for a few more smokes before it gets too hot. Cheers!
After I rinse but before I throw it on the smoker, is it a bad idea to add some maple garlic seasoning? Or will I end making it too salty?
I would not… but if you try it, please report back with the results!
Hey Chris,
Am about to get my 3rd filet smoke going…I am using the same Amazen smoke maze and Apple pellets you are in this recipe. My smoke maze has died out both of the last two smokes with the first about halfway thru the maze (worked out just fine anyway) and last weekends died out just a few inches in…had to re-start many times. Any tricks to resolve this or is it common? Thanks..Robb
Are your air vents wide open? If not, they could be choking out. I’ve had a similar problem in the past and my pellets were several years old and stored in open bags. I think the humidity got to them.
Eric, thanks! Yes, all vents are wide open! It seems the trick is to light both ends of the maze and let them burn toward each other ….Ive gotten a good 5-6 hours out of that method so far. Good point on the moisture too though. Mine are in a not well sealed bag on the porch and may be somewhat contributory. Ill keep an eye on that…Thanks again.
Am excited to try this recipe this weekend, and did purchase the A-M-AZE-N pellet maze. Just wondering how important it is to use the pellets vs chips. The pellets come in a 30 lb bag, the chips, a much smaller bag!
You can find smaller bags of pellets made specifically for that pellet maze. Do not use chips as they will burn unevenly and be too smoky.
Thanks for getting back so quickly! 2 last questions before the big day on Saturday- 2 1/2 C coarse salt means 2 1/2 C Diamond Crystal Kosher salt? And does it matter whether it is light vs Dark Brown sugar?
I used Diamonds Kosher so yes that’s what it means ☺️I don’t think it matters but I did use light brown sugar for this.