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Smoked Steelhead

rustypotts
rustypotts Posts: 265
edited October 2012 in EggHead Forum
I just had the best thing I've ever had off the Egg.  I thought I would give smoked fish a try.  I smoked some steelhead over apple wood after curing it in a brine for about 6 hrs.  I was amazed at how good it was.  I smoked it about 5 hours at 150 dome on a raised grill over a water pan.  I've got to figure out this pic thing.

Comments

  • You certainly do!  Sounds wonderful!  Steelhead is great eatin'!
    Flint, Michigan
  • nolaegghead
    nolaegghead Posts: 42,102
    Last time I did steelhead trout I did a dry cure with salt, sugar (and a little #1 powder) for a few hours.  Rinsed it off, little oil and spice and cooked indirect on the skin at somewhere around 350 for about 10 minutes, lots of cherry.  No flipping (why - you loose juice to get some grate marks) It. was. incredible.  Very juicy.
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  • Sounds awesome! 

    BTW, how did you maintain 150 dome?
    Don't get set into one form, adapt it and build your own, and let it grow, be like water. Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless — like water. Now you put water in a cup, it becomes the cup... Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend. - Bruce Lee
  • SteveWPBFL
    SteveWPBFL Posts: 1,327
    Not sure that 'counts' as "smoked" but who cares what I just said. The point is it came out great. Steelhead is a salmon? I think we saw some at the Columbia River salmon ladder a few years ago. Are we talking Costco here? Anyway. 150F is the lowest dome temp I've ever seen for anything so far here on BGE forum. If you managed to cook the Steelhead through at that temp in that time after a short brine and it came out great, it represents kind of a new 'spectrum bound', where you are on the opposite end from most, who I think generally smoke fish too high and too long until it comes out too dry and then is only usable in dip. We like it on this end of the spectrum. Then again, a lot depends on the fish and Steelhead lends itself to this end of the spectrum.
  • I'm hearing you HH.  I wondered the same thing about maintaining 150 dome without losing the fire altogether.
    Flint, Michigan
  • TBonez
    TBonez Posts: 10
    Great Post!! I love Steelhead both catchin and smokin, to answer the temp question I usually use my DigiQ to hold lower temps, I can hold a solid 150 degree's and use the Three Tier Rack when I am smoking larger batches.  I also just found these new smoking pellets called "Milt's" that combine the acutal fruit wood with a mash of the fruit i.e Apple Wood with the mash from a Tree Top juice plant...They are outstanding!
  • smokesniffer
    smokesniffer Posts: 2,016
    Can u keep the egg at 150 manually (with without the DigiQ ( i don't have one). I haven't' heard of that low a temperature before.
    Large, small, and a mini
  • Griffin
    Griffin Posts: 8,200

    Would love to have seen the fish. Sounds great.

    I've been able to hold 130-135ish using a pit controller while smoking some sausage. I took 3 good sized chunks of lump and lit them with a weed burner directly on pavement then using tongs transferred them to my large Egg, sitting them directly on a full load of unlit lump. le the pit controller take over the rest slowly bumping the temperature up at intervals. After 3 hours I was still under 175. Then I bumped it to 250 until the sausage hit 160. It can be done with a pit controller, not sure it can be done manually. I wouldn't want to try it, anyway.

    Rowlett, Texas

    Griffin's Grub or you can find me on Facebook

    The Supreme Potentate, Sovereign Commander and Sultan of Wings

     

  • nolaegghead
    nolaegghead Posts: 42,102
    edited October 2012
    At least some of the pit controllers have a ramp mode, but, from the one I looked at, what it does is the reverse of that, Griff.  Say you start the cook at 350, meat temp is 75.  As the meat gets to it's setpoint (195), it reduces the grate temp so they converge at the end.

    http://www.nakedwhiz.com/productreviews/cyberqwifi/cyberqrampon.gif
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  • DocWonmug
    DocWonmug Posts: 300
    150 is impressively good control.
    LBGE
  • I posted this comment about the trout and then went out of town and somehow missed the discussion.  My apologies to all that posted.  I'm new at this egg thing(6 months)  but I cook on it 4 or 5 times a week.  As to the temp question.  I don't know how I managed to keep it that low.  I'm going to try to repeat it but I don't even remember what kind of lump I used for that cook.  I started with RO and used it for several months but then I got several bags in a row that i didnt like so I switched to Wicked good.

    I have never calibrated my dome thermometer  but I recently got a maverick and they seem to be running about the same.  When I posted this I was so naive that I really didn't think too much about the temp question.  I am starting to get depressed thinking that I might not be able to repeat this cook.  It was some good stuff.

    Maybe I ran into some small RO and it just happened to smolder.  I do remember being surprised at the low temp.  It just sort of happened and being new to this I just assumed that the Egg new best!
  • nolaegghead
    nolaegghead Posts: 42,102
    I did some smoked cured Steelhead a while back and it was probably the best cold smoked fish I've ever had.  Kept the temp under 60F during the smoking process.


    image
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  • GK59
    GK59 Posts: 501

    Smoked steelhead. You lucky dog!  It's been years since I've had that.

    Best smoked fish ever. Not alot of oil

    By the way Steelhead are Rainbow trout which spend their life in such as one of the Great Lakes or ocean .Run up river to spawn.

    Smitty's Kid's BBQ

    Bay City,MI

  • nolaegghead
    nolaegghead Posts: 42,102
    This one was pretty oily, but it was good that way.  The oil gets concentrated - when I cured it, I must have poured out a cup of liquid. 
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  • nolaegghead......that stuff looks divine.  I've been following the cold smoke threads here and I'm gonna get one of those smokers...either the amazing or one of those spiral jobs.
  • Our Steelhead are more oily as well, because they are more related to salmon than trout. Different than great lake rainbows, it is an ocean living fresh water spawning fish (like salmon except they can return to the ocean and spawn more than once) out here in the PNW. 
    I've smoke rainbow and salmon, but never a steelhead, lately they have been part of the catch and release program. 
    Nola - 60F during the smoking process, must have been a cold day in town, or did you smoke it on the kitchen counter? 
    :)
    Delta B.C. - Whiskey and steak, because no good story ever started with someone having a salad!
  • nolaegghead
    nolaegghead Posts: 42,102
    Our Steelhead are more oily as well, because they are more related to salmon than trout. Different than great lake rainbows, it is an ocean living fresh water spawning fish (like salmon except they can return to the ocean and spawn more than once) out here in the PNW. 
    I've smoke rainbow and salmon, but never a steelhead, lately they have been part of the catch and release program. 
    Nola - 60F during the smoking process, must have been a cold day in town, or did you smoke it on the kitchen counter? 
    :)
    No, it was hot out.  I have an air conditioned smoker.  5000 btu window unit.
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