Radical Fishing - A summer treat of smoked fish

While drying probably has the more hoary pedigree, smoking meats to preserve them is no recent invention
With a modern freezer in the house, smoking and drying is not likely to be required as a primary means of food preservation.
However, the taste of freshly smoked sea-food is a culinary delight worthy of the effort it takes to produce.
While the design of smoke houses is a column on its own, the fundamentals boil down to a choice between hot or cold smoking.
Hot smoked fish is basically cooked fish with a smoky flavour.
The small portable units that are commonly and cheaply available are hot-smokers.
Cold smoking requires well designed smoke-houses for minimum heat and maximum smoke generation.
A hot smoke is a quick affair and usually over in half an hour.
It's well suited to the pace of a busy life.
Fish destined for such a smoker should be well salted and sugared before placing in the smoker.
How well salted is well salted, you may wonder?
More is better than less.
The use of salt as a glaze is a well-proven culinary techniques that prevents the salted meat from drying out.
If the salt is too much for the taste-buds of some, then it can be scraped off.
A layer of brown or raw sugar over the salt helps with both the flavour and the colour.
The mix of sweet and salty is a delight in itself and colour comes both from the effect of the smoke and the sugar which caramelises into a rich and attractive golden brown.
To reduce bulk, fish prepared for a portable hot smoker are best filleted with the skin always left intact.
The fresher the tea-tree sawdust the better the colour.
Try placing a heap directly above your meths-burner.
Extra thick fillets may require a second hit.
While warm and moist freshly smoked fish is a special treat, the smoked flavour seems to be stronger once it has cooled down.
How long hot smoked fish should be kept depends on the temperature.
Frozen at below 20C, which is the temperature used commercially to freeze fish, it could last a very long time.
However, in a fridge, I reckon a couple of days at best.
Depends on how hungry you are too, I guess.
A commercial cold smoker may take up to whole day, depending on the thickness or quality of the flesh.
On the positive side, cold smoked fish has many times the life of hot-smoked fish.
Its usually dryer, but the flavour is outstanding.
For most back-yard smoke-houses, the method is half hot, half cold, and usually takes half a day.
Manuka is the fuel of choice although most natives and fruit trees are said to do a good job.
Try soaking your split fish in a chilled brine solution over night, then just sprinkle on the sugar before smoking next morning.
Collect your wood am, smoke pm and enjoy the smoked fish for dinner.
It's a great summer barbeque surprise.