Puget Sound Pink Salmon

Tom,

I use the Dry brine as Bill does. However I never measure it.

What I do is to lay out the fish skin side down in the glass caserole (I like a deep one for this but shallow also works).

Once I have the whole bottom of the dish covered with fish I heavily cover it with the Non-Iodized Salt. Then I fully cover the salt with a layer of Brown Sugar. I make sure the salt isn't visible through the Sugar.

Then I add another layer of fish and do it again until I get to the top of the pan.

Cover it with Saran Wrap (DON'T USE FOIL) and place it in the fridge until the next day.

In the morning I will pull the fish out of the fridge and lightly rinse the fish and place it on the racks for the smoker.

Then I'll put it in the smoker using ALDER chips that have soaked overnight in a bucket of water.

Bring the smoker up to about 150-170 degrees and keep replacing the chips for the first 4 hours or so. After that I just run heat until the fish is the right firmness.

After that I'm lucky to get any as everyone wants some! :D

I'm going to have to try adding garlic and spices, but quite frankly I like it plain :)
 
BTW, it's not true that Pink are not good eating. They say if you take care of them correctly, Pinks can be as firm and flavorful as the Coho and Chinook.

Tom and I took care of the fish we caught right away, bleeding and icing them in our KatchKooler bags. When I got back to the dock, I filleted them, put them in a freezer bag, then kept them on ice. This was Saturday afternoon. I didn't get home until Sunday evening. I kept the fish on ice the whole time. Since we don't have a smoker, we baked two fillet's with Caryn's tried and true salmon recipie. It was delicious! Just as good eating as any other salmon, firm, flakey and flavorful.
 
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