Annoying Habits, My New Indoor Smoker + Soy Sauce Smoked Salmon

When you enter into a long term partnership like, say, a marriage, you agree to accept your other half’s annoying habits. Such as leaving a tiny bit (not even a complete sip) of liquid in a container and returning it to the refrigerator for him to find. And not completely closing a bottle/jar (past incidents include a bottle of aspirin, twice, spilling of most of its contents). More recently and consistently is buying myself something special mere weeks before my birthday. Funny how it turns out that I desire something around the end of June.

My early birthday gift to me was an indoor smoker by Camerons. I’m a sucker for smoked fish and it wasn’t until recently that I decided to attempt it myself at home. I’ve smoked on the outdoor grill before but since we’ve moved, we’ve only used the grill once.

Wood chips are placed on the bottom of the dish and a shallow pan is placed above, holding the items to be smoked. It can then be cooked on almost any cooktop and heated with little or no smoke. Cleanup is easy, especially if you line the inside of the smoker with foil.

I ordered the mini version and so far have used it to smoke shrimp, spareribs and fish. I’m still tweaking the recipes but so far love smoked fish brined in a soy sauce solution for a few hours.

The salmon is only smoked for about 20 minutes or until flaky and what comes out is a richly seasoned, slightly sweet salmon.

Paul eventually found me a birthday gift after much probing: a juice extractor. More on that later!

Soy Sauce Smoked Fish

1 pound salmon, rinsed and patted dry
1 cup water
1/4 cup low-sodium soy sauce
3 tablespoons brown sugar
2 tablespoons Kosher salt
1 tablespoon granulated garlic

Dissolve soy sauce, brown sugar, salt and garlic in water.

Arrange salmon in a baking dish and pour brine over fish. Cover and refrigerate for 8 hours.

Remove fish from brine and pat with paper towels. Arrange on plate and allow fish to dry in refrigerator for at least 4 hours.

Place fish in smoker and cook according to smoker’s directions.