Hot smoked pike is a delicious dish for any table. Pleasant aroma, delicate taste and amazing appearance will distinguish this dish from the rest. You will learn how to smoke hot smoked pike, how to choose wood chips and other secrets of cooking this dish by reading this article.
Why a hot way of smoking?
There are two ways of smoking: cold and hot. For pike is best to choose a way to hot-smoked, but why?
- Although cold-smoked and is more harmless to the body, but the smokehouse for it requires a special, for many it just can not be. In addition, if you even buy, then it costs much more than a smoke-cured smokehouse.
- Time. When cold smoked, much more time is spent than hot. When smoked pike in the smokehouse smoked on cooking delicious fish takes only 45-60 minutes.
- Color. Hot smoked pike will look more rosy, mouth-watering and more aromatic than after cold-smoked!
What do you need?
To cook hot smoked pike at home you will need:
- Pike (preferably several fishes). It is advisable to take not too large, but not too small individuals. The ideal weight is 2.5-3 kg. Keep in mind that you will need to cut off the fish head and fins.
- Salt. It all depends on what kind of fish you are going to smoke. For 2.5 kg of pike you need about 350 g of salt.
- Seasoning for fish.
- Smokehouse. Any smokehouse for hot smoking is suitable. In hardware stores a smokehouse can be found even for 200-300 rubles.
- Wood chips. This is a special smokehouse fuel. On the choice of chips it will be written below.
Wood chip selection
For a description of the procedure for choosing wood chips, a whole paragraph was not just highlighted because it plays an important role in smoking! The taste and color of our future hot smoked pike will depend on it! In general, everyone has different tastes, and over time, a person already knows what kind of chips he needs. Someone makes it himself, and someone buys. By the way, a very wide assortment is on sale: apricot, alder, beech, cherry, pear. The most universal is alder, but you can mix several species together, for example, alder with apricot. The price of chips is quite low, about 80 rubles per pack weight 0.5 kg.
Fish cutting
Now we begin to describe the process of smoking. To begin with, wash our pike. Many say that in the fins of pike are the most harmful substances and they should not be eaten. Believe it or not - everyone's business, but all the same they will interfere and have to get rid of them. We take a sharp knife and cut off the fins. Tail and head are also not recommended to be left, we also remove them. The next step is to pull out all the insides. Of course, some smoked with the internals, but considering all the dirt that accumulates there, it is better to clean. We open the belly of the pike and take out all the insides with our hands, and then we wash the carcass. As a result, we still have a clean fish, fully prepared for smoking.
Solim
Of course, you can and marinate for pike smoked, but it needs to spend more time and ingredients. Salt is not only a publicly available product, but also cheap. It is for this reason that she does not need to be sorry. Mix salt with fish seasoning. Seasoning fit any, even the cheapest. About 2 packs per 0.5 kg of salt - perfect ratio! Rub salt with seasoning on all sides of the fish. It is important that you need to salt in some container, for example, in a plastic container. We put the already grated fish in a container top belly. It is important that the pike lay just like that, because the area of the spine is the thickest, and when it lies, all the salt will drain down, thereby falling into the thickest part. After that, sprinkle everything with salt again. Close the container and leave it for 5-8 hours. If the fish is too big and the smokehouse is small, then you can cut the pike into small pieces to fit in the smokehouse. Of course, you can leave it for the night, but then before smoking it is better to wash the pike to remove excess salt.
Smoking
So we come to the most long-awaited - the process of smoking. This is a whole science! So fish have walked, but first you need to prepare everything, to get a smoked pike. First of all, you need to light a fire. Coals will not work, because we need open fire. The bonfire should be medium, not very strong, so that all the chips do not burn out immediately, but not too weak, so that the preparation does not drag on for several hours. Next, put bricks next to the fire, or some other device to put a smokehouse over the fire. Next, spread the chips in the smokehouse. There are a lot of different opinions about this: someone says that they need to be strewed only in the center, some are sure that they need to be around the edges. Choose something average, pour a little wood chips over the entire surface of the smokehouse.
It is also very important that a fat pan is available. The fact is that if there is no pan where the fat will flow, then it will fall on the chips. In principle, there is no big problem with that, but then smoked pike succeed with a little sour, and maybe with a slightly bitter aftertaste. But, unfortunately, in cheap smokehouses for 200-300 rubles, there are often no pallets. In this case, you can use ordinary food foil. Just put an even layer of foil on the surface of the chips so that the smoke can pass and the fat flows there. Still, of course, you can put some aluminum utensils at the bottom.
Now let's move on to how to stack fish on a net. It should be folded in such a way that the pieces of fish do not "feel" crowded. Between the pieces should be at least some space is small, but the space. The last step left! Close the smokehouse and set over the fire. As soon as smoke begins to seep from the smokehouse - we begin to pinpoint time! Average fish smoking time is 45 minutes. But it all depends on the pieces and volume of the fish. In principle, you can open a smokehouse every 20 minutes and check its availability. As soon as the fish gets a beautiful shade and is easy to separate, the pike is ready. So they smoked the hot smoked pike! How easy it is, right? Remember that hot smoked products should be eaten only after cooling.