Went to Barleans while doing errands yesterday and picked up a whole, fresh caught Coho. Before filleting it was 6.25 pounds.
In my quest to be able to make great (not just pretty good) smoked salmon I took a slight deviation from my usual routine. I decided that instead of my usual brining overnight (usually about 10-12 hours) I would try it for a shorter period (~6hrs).
So I only just put it in the brine a half an hour ago (Sun. 8AM)
Here's the brine recipe I just used. Its slightly modified from one of my previous salmon batches.
6 Cups water
1/2 cup Brown sugar
1/4 cup Caning/Pickling salt
1/8 cup Molasses
3 Tbsp Sriracha
< 1/4 cup honey
< 1/4 cup Kikkoman Soy Sauce
This salmon came out kind of flavorless. I think the extra short brine time, totally didn't work.
The fish didnt really have any of the brine flavor, and it got kind of mushy when I smoked it.
I think because there was still way too much moisture in it.
Oh well.
Still ate it all though...
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