Testing smoke flavor with string cheese

Hi, I'm actually SandRaven's wife. I just had to sneak in here to tell you guys that the salmon mentioned in the post above was TO DIE FOR!! If you have an opportunity to do it, this would be awesome to serve with bagels and cream cheese to your wives on Mother's Day next Sunday, maybe breakfast in bed?? Okay, back to your regularly scheduled discussion...

Sand Raven
are you cold smoking the salmon ? or hot smoking if so please post your method

It started off as a cold smoke (which I'm new at), but the salmon got a little warmer than I wanted, like 75F for 1.5 hrs, so I decided to take it up to an internal temp of 145F to make sure no one would get sick.

It turned out great, it was along the lines of what you would find as an appitizer at a nice brunch, not raw, like cold smoked, and not cooked, like a hot smoke. I guess you can call it a warm smoke.

The salmon was 1 9.5 chunk of Salmon, I rinsed it, removed the skin, and put it in a dry brine.

The dry brine was made from the following:

2 T of Quick Tender (from Morton Salt)
1 C Salt (pickling)
1/2 C Dark Brown Sugar
1 t garlic powder

I put the salmon in the brine in gladware, and put it in the frig for 6 hours, nex time I'll try 8 hours. Next I rinsed it in ice water for 1 hr. Then I let in air dry in the frig overnight.

Next morning, I put the salmon into the smoker, it was 42F.

Added 2 oz of maple chips to the wood pan, and 2 8" pans of ice into the smoker.

Turned on the smoker till I got hood smoke coming out the top, and shut if off.

After 1/2 Hr. the smoke stopped coming out, so dumped out the wood tray, added 1 oz of apple chips, and ran it again, After another 1/2 hour I did it again. Now after 1.5 hrs, the salmon was up to 75F, so without adding any more wood, I turned the smoker back on, and raised it to 175F. When the Salmon reached 145F I took it out, I think it was another 1 Hr.

Results

It was very moist, nicely smoky, and firm, and just a little flakey. I'll post some photos this evening.