New to Smoking

There's a learning curve to be sure. You will be doing what's known as warm smoking, where some level of heat is part of the process. That's the common smoking we all do. There's cold smoking also, but that's a whole different thing. So with warm smoking there will be a few different processes. There's the wood chunks you use for the smoke. I liked hickory but many think it has a sharp taste. There's also mesquite and some other woods like apple and whatnot. Whatever wood you use, you'll want to soak them in water for a while so they smoke and burn slow. Then there's brining. This is supposed to pull moisture out of what you are smoking. The basic brine is with kosher salt, but people add all kinds of things (like brown sugar, etc) to their brines. Probably a load of brine recipes on line also. I mostly smoked fish and for that you soak the fish in brine overnight in the fridge. Then there's the air dry. I would get up early in the morning, pat the fish dry with paper towel and then lay them on a rack and put them out on the deck to dry. Flys were never much of a problem for me, but if they show up, you can dry them indoors by an open window. Ideally you want some air moving over them. I would usually do this for several hours. Then I would make the fire and let the coals all grey out before I started. I typically rubbed a small amount of toasted sesame oil on the fish and sprinkled on some cayenne pepper for flavor, and then add some wet chunks for smoke and start smoking. Oily fish smoke best. You know those big brut blue fish that don't taste too good when cooked? They're really good smoked. Enjoy.
 
richtrox said:
There's a learning curve to be sure. You will be doing what's known as warm smoking, where some level of heat is part of the process. That's the common smoking we all do. There's cold smoking also, but that's a whole different thing. So with warm smoking there will be a few different processes. There's the wood chunks you use for the smoke. I liked hickory but many think it has a sharp taste. There's also mesquite and some other woods like apple and whatnot. Whatever wood you use, you'll want to soak them in water for a while so they smoke and burn slow. Then there's brining. This is supposed to pull moisture out of what you are smoking. The basic brine is with kosher salt, but people add all kinds of things (like brown sugar, etc) to their brines. Probably a load of brine recipes on line also. I mostly smoked fish and for that you soak the fish in brine overnight in the fridge. Then there's the air dry. I would get up early in the morning, pat the fish dry with paper towel and then lay them on a rack and put them out on the deck to dry. Flys were never much of a problem for me, but if they show up, you can dry them indoors by an open window. Ideally you want some air moving over them. I would usually do this for several hours. Then I would make the fire and let the coals all grey out before I started. I typically rubbed a small amount of toasted sesame oil on the fish and sprinkled on some cayenne pepper for flavor, and then add some wet chunks for smoke and start smoking. Oily fish smoke best. You know those big brut blue fish that don't taste too good when cooked? They're really good smoked. Enjoy.
Click to expand...
Blues one of my FAV SMOKED
 
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Time for some trial and error ?
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Been smoking briskets in my weber this fall and winter. I turn on the back burner to mid flame and keep the front two burners off. It keeps it's temp pretty steady. I also add some pellet smokers in a stainless mesh tube for the smoke. The family loves it.
Gonna try some of the resipes on Cany link.
 
This was a project I started as I taught my self to weld.
I was going to turn it into a smoker/grill.
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An old rusted air compressor tank and two refrigerant gas tanks.
Hopefully I can get it done before the spring, when the boat work takes over all my free time.
 

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