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Bluefish smoking tips

Good Information 
4K views 22 replies 15 participants last post by  merogers 
#1 · (Edited)
Been smoking them for about 8 years now and have learned a few things that make a better product. I hope the pics load in order. Oh well, they didn't.

1. Ready to go in the smoker. Spray the bejesus out of everything with Pam, top and bottom, makes clean-up so much easier. The plastic mats I got out of BP years ago and are fantastic, no more falling through the grates and they make flipping the fillets much easier. Spray them too and you can throw them in the diswasher with the grates. My Rubbermaid brining container is in the back also, great since I don't have to cover a bowl with plastic etc.

2. My smoker rig and the chips I use.

3. Fish dried until it has a pellicle. (This should have been the first pic.) I have these baking racks that are elevated about an inch, both sides are ready for smoking. Paper underneath helps with clean-up.

4. Flip the fillets and rotate the position of the racks after 2 hours. You can see the fish on the right is more done, it was on the bottom, now it switches with the rack from the top of the smoker. Also, give the racks a quarter turn, there are definitely hot spots and cool spots. Stir chips and add a small handful to the pan.

5. After 4 hours, flip the fillets and brush lightly with Maple syrup. Rotate racks again as you see how they are finishing.

6. The chip pan after 4 hours, don't empty it. It will take longer to smoke again. Just add more and blow on it to get it rolling. If it flames for a second, great.

7. The pan with more chips.

8. After another hour, consolidate the fillets on the bottom two racks, flip, and brush with Maple syrup.

9. The final product. Eat tomorrow with mayo, lettuce and good tomato for the best damn summer "BLT" ever.
 

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#3 ·
Some good tips are to soak your fillets in a brine with your selected spices overnight. Rinse and completely dry the fillets until a pelicle forms before smoking. Smoke with hickory at 225 degrees for about 4 hours. Some folks brush with honey or maple syrup before smoking. There are many recipes on the internet. Enjoy them. They look great. I just made two 5 gallon buckets of chum from elewives and will be on the blues soon.........Gary
 
#8 ·
I had about 100 pounds of elewives and 20 pounds of peelers given to me last year and I just ran them through my deer grinder. You can get fresh elewives from Leo behind Cantlers. He runs his nets daily. The bigger blues should be moving in soon around Poplar and the Gum Thickets.
 
#10 ·
If you want to save time on brining, you can use a dry brine (I like this method better). Equal parts kosher salt and brown sugar with a bit of old bay. Generously coat the fillets and place in frig on wax paper for 1 hour. Beware, this will suck out quite a bit of moisture, so be sure you have them in a dish or sheet with raised edges. Rinse, pat dry, leave out in room temp til pedicle forms and proceed.
 
#12 ·
Pellicle (cooking), a skin or coating of proteins on the surface of meat, fish or poultry, which allow smoke to better adhere the surface of the meat during the smoking process. Useful in all smoking applications and with any kind of animal protein, it is best used with fish where the flesh of, say, Salmon, forms a pellicle, the surface that will attract more smoke to adhere to it than would be the case if you had not used it: Without a pellicle; the fish would be inedibly dry from enough smoking to produce a tasty finished product. It is the pellicle which permits the transformation creating delectable Smoked salmon.
 
#15 ·
Do The Smoked Bluies ReFreeze Well?

merogers,

Thanks for the post! Do you, or anyone else for that matter, know if the smoked blues will freeze well?

I'm getting low on blues from last year, and every time I try and go south lately, the wind is howling.
 
#23 ·
The bigger ones in the fall, (There's usually a great run of over 20" out of Buzz's in October) I'll cut out the dark line in the middle and then cut each side diagonally to increase surface area. Takes up the smoke better and dries them out a little. Freeze just great when vacuum sealed. Mark.
 
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