Smoked Steelhead

That was my first experience smoking some fish. I had some steelhead lying around in my freezer and really wanted to do a low and slow cook.

The first thing I did is to cure that fish and let it wait in the refrigerator for the night. The brine recipe I used was very simple and was not the point of the experience here. I went with a very standard mix of dark brown sugar, kosher salt, crushed garlic and black pepper. I've applied very generous amount of the brine on the fish, wrapped it in double plastic wraps and placed it in a pan in the refrigerator for the night. You should have it cured for at least 8 hours according to my research.




Brine recipe:
- dark brown sugar (1 cup)
- kosher salt (1/2 cup)
- crushed garlic (4 cloves)
- black pepper (2 Tbsp of black pepper)

In the morning, I've unwrapped that fish and rinsed it to remove the largest part of the brine. (that is up to you, but I would find it way too salty if I wouldn't rinse it). Put it back in a pan without anything else on it directly in the refrigerator for the next 2 or 3 hours and start preparing your barbecue for a long cook, building your fire carefully with the biggest pieces at the bottom and making sure it's clean enough.

I was able to keep the temperature between 180˚F and 200˚F for the whole cook, which lasted for about 8 hours. There is no perfect amount of time here, it  really depends on how you like your fish smoked. I saw some people smoke it for as little as one hour, and some go crazy and smoke their fish for a full twenty hour. You'll have to experiment and find out what you like!

Personally I think that my 8 hours cook was a little too long even though it was pure goodness when we ate it, I think it could have been cut in half and be a little more juicy and tender.

Here is how it looked coming out of the egg

The skin of the fish that I left purposefully on came off the fish just by pulling with two fingers and it was smelling so good I was drooling.

We served this with some salad, some cheeses and a good Chardonnay from Chateau Ste-Michelle. We will most definitely do that again, but next time, I'll make a much bigger quantity now that I know it is that good. Once smoked, the fish can be kept for a very long time in the refrigerator without turning bad.