Smoked Salmon

While I was at the US Open last week, I ended up hanging out in Manhattan for the night. The following morning my friends and I grabbed bagels before heading back to PA. My bagel of choice is usually an everything bagel with cream cheese and smoked salmon. That got me thinking. I can do this. ...and I can do it better than they can.

Start with a nice cut of salmon. I got this piece from Shop Rite in West Chester, PA. Their fish department has improved recently so I have started going there more often.

As with many other meats that I cook for a long time, I first placed the fish in a brine overnight. I used a really simple brine of 4 cups water and 12 tablespoons of kosher salt. I also mixed in a half-cup of brown sugar. That's all I put in there but you could probably experiment with other spices as well.

Smoking the fish can be a little difficult a Weber grill because you really need to control the heat. Ideally you want the heat to be around 100-150 degrees. I was able to maintain this heat for about 5 hours, with one sleeve of coals, by almost completely closing all of the vents. The results were spectacular.
I'll be doing this much more often. Stay tuned for my smoked trout.