Smoked Sockeye Salmon

Smoked Salmon

Salmon in the Smoker

Talk about soul food. Home smoked fresh Sockeye Salmon has to be on the top of the list.


It can be eaten as a meal; poached, fried, or marinated and on the BBQ, as an appetizer, in a salad, as a salad, see my BBQ Salmon Salad, or make Grav Lax.


You name it and you can probably do it with smoked salmon.


I originally got this recipe from my old neighbour Ruby. She is such a great cook and baker.


Feel free to experiment with the ingredients.

Ingredients:

• 8 Fillets of Sockeye Salmon
• 2 cups or 475 ml of Brown Sugar
• ½ cup of Salt
• Honey or Maple Syrup
• Canola Oil

Mix the salt and sugar together well.

Smother the salmon with the salt and sugar mixture.

Dry off the filled with paper towels and pick over each fillet and pull out any pin-bones. Then on a cutting board, rub the salt-sugar mix all over the flesh side.


After that cut the salmon in about 3-inch pieces and stick in a ziplock bag. Let sit for about 6 hours or overnight, turning every hour or so. It will form its own brine.

Once the 6 hours are up, rinse each fillet and pad dry with paper towels. Spray the smoking racks with some canola oil. 

Now brush on some warm honey or maple syrup on top of each piece. If you prefer some pepper, ground some on the fillets. Set the salmon on the racks.

At this point, your smoker should be going with half apple and half cherry wood. At this point you only want smoke, without any extra heat, keeping the temperature around 120 F or 48 C for 2 hours. The vent on the top of the smoker should be wide open so the smoke can move around freely. After the two hours, bring the heat up to 180-200 F or 80-90 C for two hours more. Then turn the smoke off and just use the heat to finish the salmon off.

Let the salmon cool on cooling racks then vacuum pack and freeze.

Here is a link to my YouTube Channel where you can watch the whole process.

Good luck,

Anders