page_title: Smoked salmon
section_title: Cold smoking
hierarchical_section_title: Smoked salmon / Production / Cold smoking
caption_attribution_description: Smoke house at Boone Hall Plantation
context_page_description: Smoked salmon is a preparation of salmon, typically a fillet that has been cured and hot or cold smoked. Due to its moderately high price, smoked salmon is considered a delicacy. Although the term lox is sometimes applied to smoked salmon, they are different products.
context_section_description: Most smoked salmon is cold smoked, typically at 37 °C (99 °F). Cold smoking does not cook the fish, resulting in a delicate texture. Although some smoke houses go for a deliberately 'oaky' style with prolonged exposure to smoke from oak chips, industrial production favours less exposure to smoke and a blander style, using cheaper woods.
  Originally, prepared fish were upside hung in lines on racks, or tenters, within the kiln. Workers would climb up and straddle the racks while hanging the individual lines in ascending order. Small circular wood chip fires would be lit at floor level and allowed to smoke slowly throughout the night. The wood fire was damped with sawdust to create smoke; this was constantly tended as naked flames would cook the fish rather than smoke it. The required duration of smoking has always been gauged by a skilled or 'master smoker' who manually checks for optimum smoking conditions.
  Smoked salmon was introduced into the UK from Eastern Europe. Jewish immigrants from Russia and Poland brought the technique of salmon smoking to London's east End, where they settled, in the late 19th century. They smoked salmon as way to preserve it as refrigeration was very basic. In the early years, they were not aware that there was a salmon native to the UK so they imported Baltic salmon in barrels of salt water. However, having discovered the wild Scottish salmon coming down to the fish market at Billingsgate each summer, they started smoking these fish instead. The smoking process has changed over the years and many contemporary smokehouses have left the traditional methods using brick kilns behind in favour of commercial methods. Only a handful of traditional smokehouses remain such as John Ross Jr (Aberdeen) Ltd and the Stornoway Smokehouse in the Outer Hebrides.  The oldest smokehouse in Scotland is the Old Salmon Fish House built on the banks of the River Ugie in 1585, although not at first for smoking.  The oldest smokehouse in England is the 1760 Old Smokehouse in Raglan Street, Lowestoft.
  The Northwest Indian Tribes and Alaska Natives have a cold smoking style that is wholly unique, resulting in a dried, "jerky-style" smoked salmon. In the Pacific Northwest this style of salmon has been used for centuries as a primary source of food for numerous Indian tribes. Traditionally smoked salmon has been a staple of north-western American tribes and Canadian First Nations people. To preserve indefinitely in modern times, the fish is typically pressure-cooked.
caption: A smoke house at Boone Hall Plantation
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